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In a twisted sort of way I am happy to see these types of ransomware attacks making headlines. Before it was much harder to quantify how much a breach might cos

In a twisted sort of way I am happy to see these types of ransomware attacks making headlines. Before it was much harder to quantify how much a breach might cost but with ransomeware you get a fuzzy lower bound. Also the prevalence of these attacks might actually make us all safer in the long run.

enkid 5y ago
Absolutely, it's better to have a ransomware attack against the workstations instead of a more developed attack that blew the pipeline up.
- runeks 5y ago
  This is interesting. Ransomware authors may be protecting their targets against destructive attacks since this would reduce their profits. In the same way that botnets attempt to protect their host from being infected by competing malware.
dehrmann 5y ago
This one in particular is good because, it's public, it's not that scary, but it's easy to make the jump to scary attacks.
- deleted 5y ago
  [deleted]
bourgwaletariat 5y ago
I think I understand your POV and can see why one might find some peace in it, but I don't. More crime, or I suppose mroe news about it, so we know how much crime costs? More attacks make us safer? It's a means justify the ends argument, but it doesn't hold water. It's eerily similar to "burn it all down" https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Accelerationism https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Accelerationism, which, itself is on the rise and burning from both ends. I infer your point to be that more attacks might cause the victims to step up their defenses. It's a cat and mouse game. Always has been in all realms. "It'll get worse before it gets better." I've been hearing that for decades. I'm starting to wonder, due to what appears to be a decline in civility. Following the rules only works if we all do. Those who eschew the rules have an obvious advantage. Where has integrity gone? We are tearing ourselves apart and justifying it ... or coming to terms with it I suppose, by saying it'll be better some day. Well... when... exactly? By what measure will we know? I know Stephen Pinker, Hans Rosling, and various folks say it's the best time to be a human. Okay. Sure. I see the math. I'd like to see them update their charts for data out over the past year. But ... anecdotally, none of that math seems to percolate down to my community. The people around me are in constant fear. I just saw a woman walking down the road, all by herself, I had clear vision for a mile and so no one else but her... and she was wearing a mask. She was afraid. She was anxious. Regardless of the relative safety that exists today, or the belief that it'll be safer tomorrow because of the lack of said safety, the people around me aren't feeling it. They're buying guns because red people are coming for them... or the blue people already are. Or the government will. There is literally no milk at the store because of an HDPE shortage prompting the grocer to put a Force Majeur notice on the dairy fridge door. Trust has broken down. Fear of our own neighbors is up. Crime is up. Poverty is up. Suicide is up. Cyber crime is up. Inflation is up. The Gini coefficient is up. I really have trouble believing that making it worse real fast, or even reporting more of it, is going to make it better. I don't see it.
- sky_rw 5y ago
  While you’re probably right on the zeitgeist aspect of this, I think you’re missing the practical aspects of what OP is talking about. We have major vulnerabilities to key infrastructure components. Publicly exposing these helps harden them. Yes 9-11 added a ton of security theater and fear, but it also resulted in armored doors on airplane cockpits. I’d like to see the armored door of the energy infrastructure implemented.
  - bourgwaletariat 5y ago
    That's not the society I want. I don't want stronger doors everywhere. Tougher locks everywhere. Onerous security everywhere. I prefer a society where passengers are free to chit chat with the pilots when they aren't busy. Where children who might be interested in being a pilot can see a cockpit in the air and how it's done. I remember reading about the history of security in ancient Rome. The lengths to which normal citizens had to go to to protect their homes. I don't want that. No one wants that. No one wanted that then either. It's a distraction from productivity. It's a constant worry factor that consumes brain waves that could be spent making all our lives better. Instead, we have to divert our attention to those who want to make it worse.
    - mindslight 5y ago
      While I wholeheartedly agree with what you're saying for the physical world, the digital world is completely different. In the physical world, the scope of any action is inherently localized. But with digital systems it takes just one person out of seven billion (or even just the right software bug) to create a global scale problem. The Internet is best treated as a source of malicious noise.
      - bourgwaletariat 5y ago
        The main purpose of government is to protect its citizens from foreign invaders. I don't see any difference here.
vmception 5y ago
Agreed. It also tells us where bug bounty rewards should be in value. As the structure of bug bounty programs are completely wrong and the rewards are undervalued. The market is literally saying they are undervalued. The flogging will continue until bug bounties improve.

enkid 5y ago

Absolutely, it's better to have a ransomware attack against the workstations instead of a more developed attack that blew the pipeline up.

runeks 5y ago
This is interesting. Ransomware authors may be protecting their targets against destructive attacks since this would reduce their profits. In the same way that botnets attempt to protect their host from being infected by competing malware.

dehrmann 5y ago

This one in particular is good because, it's public, it's not that scary, but it's easy to make the jump to scary attacks.

deleted 5y ago
[deleted]

bourgwaletariat 5y ago

I think I understand your POV and can see why one might find some peace in it, but I don't. More crime, or I suppose mroe news about it, so we know how much crime costs? More attacks make us safer? It's a means justify the ends argument, but it doesn't hold water. It's eerily similar to "burn it all down" https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Accelerationism https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Accelerationism, which, itself is on the rise and burning from both ends. I infer your point to be that more attacks might cause the victims to step up their defenses. It's a cat and mouse game. Always has been in all realms. "It'll get worse before it gets better." I've been hearing that for decades. I'm starting to wonder, due to what appears to be a decline in civility. Following the rules only works if we all do. Those who eschew the rules have an obvious advantage. Where has integrity gone? We are tearing ourselves apart and justifying it ... or coming to terms with it I suppose, by saying it'll be better some day. Well... when... exactly? By what measure will we know? I know Stephen Pinker, Hans Rosling, and various folks say it's the best time to be a human. Okay. Sure. I see the math. I'd like to see them update their charts for data out over the past year. But ... anecdotally, none of that math seems to percolate down to my community. The people around me are in constant fear. I just saw a woman walking down the road, all by herself, I had clear vision for a mile and so no one else but her... and she was wearing a mask. She was afraid. She was anxious. Regardless of the relative safety that exists today, or the belief that it'll be safer tomorrow because of the lack of said safety, the people around me aren't feeling it. They're buying guns because red people are coming for them... or the blue people already are. Or the government will. There is literally no milk at the store because of an HDPE shortage prompting the grocer to put a Force Majeur notice on the dairy fridge door. Trust has broken down. Fear of our own neighbors is up. Crime is up. Poverty is up. Suicide is up. Cyber crime is up. Inflation is up. The Gini coefficient is up. I really have trouble believing that making it worse real fast, or even reporting more of it, is going to make it better. I don't see it.

sky_rw 5y ago
While you’re probably right on the zeitgeist aspect of this, I think you’re missing the practical aspects of what OP is talking about. We have major vulnerabilities to key infrastructure components. Publicly exposing these helps harden them. Yes 9-11 added a ton of security theater and fear, but it also resulted in armored doors on airplane cockpits. I’d like to see the armored door of the energy infrastructure implemented.
- bourgwaletariat 5y ago
  That's not the society I want. I don't want stronger doors everywhere. Tougher locks everywhere. Onerous security everywhere. I prefer a society where passengers are free to chit chat with the pilots when they aren't busy. Where children who might be interested in being a pilot can see a cockpit in the air and how it's done. I remember reading about the history of security in ancient Rome. The lengths to which normal citizens had to go to to protect their homes. I don't want that. No one wants that. No one wanted that then either. It's a distraction from productivity. It's a constant worry factor that consumes brain waves that could be spent making all our lives better. Instead, we have to divert our attention to those who want to make it worse.
  - mindslight 5y ago
    While I wholeheartedly agree with what you're saying for the physical world, the digital world is completely different. In the physical world, the scope of any action is inherently localized. But with digital systems it takes just one person out of seven billion (or even just the right software bug) to create a global scale problem. The Internet is best treated as a source of malicious noise.
    - bourgwaletariat 5y ago
      The main purpose of government is to protect its citizens from foreign invaders. I don't see any difference here.

vmception 5y ago

Agreed. It also tells us where bug bounty rewards should be in value. As the structure of bug bounty programs are completely wrong and the rewards are undervalued. The market is literally saying they are undervalued. The flogging will continue until bug bounties improve.