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Yes, this is the big elephant in the room > But doing so increases the risk to their personal safety and fortunes by some non-trivial amount, said Allison Nixo

Yes, this is the big elephant in the room > But doing so increases the risk to their personal safety and fortunes by some non-trivial amount, said Allison Nixon, chief research officer at New York City-based cyber investigations firm Unit221B. Oh really? So do you mean those people are very careful to not toe some governments in extreme fear of them? No wonder the western countries are taken as fools. They know no one is going to wake up in an "uncomfortable position" by messing with western companies and governments. Maybe what we need is to take out those checks from the malwares and just resent them where they came from.

FpUser 6y ago
>"No wonder the western countries are taken as fools. They know no one is going to wake up in an "uncomfortable position" by messing with western companies and governments." You can definitely get into "uncomfortable position" when messing with western countries. But if hacker resides in Russia there is not much the West can do as Russia does not extradite their citizens. The West in this case has to rely on Russia chasing after them and due to a very "warm and fuzzy" relations lately it is not likely to happen as long as those hackers do not mess with the Russia itself. Sanctions might have helped but since Russia already sanctioned up to it's gills it probably does not care anymore.
- raverbashing 6y ago
  Meanwhile Russian tourists continue to visit picturesque cathedrals across Europe.
- perlgeek 6y ago
  More than one Russian hacker was arrested when making vacation in a country that has an extradition treaty with the US. That's far less effective than we would want, but it's a bit more than nothing.
  - FpUser 6y ago
    >"More than one Russian hacker was arrested when making vacation in a country that has an extradition treaty with the US." Being an idiot has a consequences. I have no idea why did those Russian hackers ever assume that they'd be safe when traveling. They've committed crime and were stupid enough to basically ask to get arrested.
LeifCarrotson 6y ago
American hackers are no less careful to avoid running services or communicating through American datacenters. Everyone knows that Google, Apple, Facebook, Amazon etc. are more than happy to turn over the IP address logs and any unencrypted data whenever law enforcement brings a valid search warrant, and sometimes they'll offer a dragnet of all their data when law enforcement just asks nicely. The problem is that law enforcement is listening to local victims: Hack Colonial Pipeline and ask them to bring you a bag of cash in the parking lot, and you won't be meeting with their CFO - that guy in a suit is from the FBI. Hack Nord Stream, and you'll make some Russians angry, but they're going to have a hard time bringing that complaint to the FBI. To make this more sensible, we need a paradigm shift. With a global Internet separating victims and hackers, while national governments only look for domestic victims of domestic perpetrators, you're going to end up with a lot of useless fist-shaking across the borders. I'm not suggesting that the answer is extradition of scapegoats at the whims of foreign powers, either, but our small, modern world has a lot of growing up to do before this makes sense.
- bluGill 6y ago
  Actually a Russian being hacked by an American will find a very interested FBI - who will promptly send all the needed evidence to whoever in the government deals with overseas issues. In turn this will lead to the Americans proposing an exchange of criminals with the Russians. It might or might not happen depending on details, but the proposal will be made. Note, the above assumes you are not a target of a US military operation. If the US military is hacking you, then don't waste your time with the FBI (but if that is the case you already have access to "other" means to respond)
nzmsv 6y ago
I'll just leave this here... https://www.eurogamer.net/articles/2011-02-21-the-boy-who-stole-half-life-2-article https://www.eurogamer.net/articles/2011-02-21-the-boy-who-st... "Have you any idea how lucky you are that we got to you before you got on that plane?"

FpUser 6y ago

>"No wonder the western countries are taken as fools. They know no one is going to wake up in an "uncomfortable position" by messing with western companies and governments." You can definitely get into "uncomfortable position" when messing with western countries. But if hacker resides in Russia there is not much the West can do as Russia does not extradite their citizens. The West in this case has to rely on Russia chasing after them and due to a very "warm and fuzzy" relations lately it is not likely to happen as long as those hackers do not mess with the Russia itself. Sanctions might have helped but since Russia already sanctioned up to it's gills it probably does not care anymore.

raverbashing 6y ago
Meanwhile Russian tourists continue to visit picturesque cathedrals across Europe.
perlgeek 6y ago
More than one Russian hacker was arrested when making vacation in a country that has an extradition treaty with the US. That's far less effective than we would want, but it's a bit more than nothing.
- FpUser 6y ago
  >"More than one Russian hacker was arrested when making vacation in a country that has an extradition treaty with the US." Being an idiot has a consequences. I have no idea why did those Russian hackers ever assume that they'd be safe when traveling. They've committed crime and were stupid enough to basically ask to get arrested.

LeifCarrotson 6y ago

American hackers are no less careful to avoid running services or communicating through American datacenters. Everyone knows that Google, Apple, Facebook, Amazon etc. are more than happy to turn over the IP address logs and any unencrypted data whenever law enforcement brings a valid search warrant, and sometimes they'll offer a dragnet of all their data when law enforcement just asks nicely. The problem is that law enforcement is listening to local victims: Hack Colonial Pipeline and ask them to bring you a bag of cash in the parking lot, and you won't be meeting with their CFO - that guy in a suit is from the FBI. Hack Nord Stream, and you'll make some Russians angry, but they're going to have a hard time bringing that complaint to the FBI. To make this more sensible, we need a paradigm shift. With a global Internet separating victims and hackers, while national governments only look for domestic victims of domestic perpetrators, you're going to end up with a lot of useless fist-shaking across the borders. I'm not suggesting that the answer is extradition of scapegoats at the whims of foreign powers, either, but our small, modern world has a lot of growing up to do before this makes sense.

bluGill 6y ago
Actually a Russian being hacked by an American will find a very interested FBI - who will promptly send all the needed evidence to whoever in the government deals with overseas issues. In turn this will lead to the Americans proposing an exchange of criminals with the Russians. It might or might not happen depending on details, but the proposal will be made. Note, the above assumes you are not a target of a US military operation. If the US military is hacking you, then don't waste your time with the FBI (but if that is the case you already have access to "other" means to respond)

nzmsv 6y ago

I'll just leave this here... https://www.eurogamer.net/articles/2011-02-21-the-boy-who-stole-half-life-2-article https://www.eurogamer.net/articles/2011-02-21-the-boy-who-st... "Have you any idea how lucky you are that we got to you before you got on that plane?"