This attack is particular nasty because it was not targeting security researchers personally but their exploits - which is more difficult to protect. Imagine I'

This attack is particular nasty because it was not targeting security researchers personally but their exploits - which is more difficult to protect. Imagine I'm a developer who follows good security practice, I use the web, read mails, and write code in a fully up-to-date OpenBSD system, I use pledge() sandboxing and BSD jails routinely, and I don't open any untrusted nontext file due to its risks. Instead, I do all the risky security analysis in an insecure Windows machine. Now, if someone is going after me in person, I'm well protected. But if someone is going after my exploits, not so much, this setup has zero protection. If the machine contains PoCs from my previous projects, all of them will be stolen. Protection is possible (e.g. separating the test environment to "trusted" and "untrusted" parts, keep sensitive PoCs in the trusted system, do test/RE in an "untrusted" system, roll back the system image every time one finishes an "untrusted" work), but more difficult.