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I am strongly of the opinion paying cyber ransoms should be a felony punishable by jail time. It's the only cure. Absent that, the question is only how the r

I am strongly of the opinion paying cyber ransoms should be a felony punishable by jail time. It's the only cure. Absent that, the question is only how the ransomer gets paid, not whether they hold assets for ransom.

cma 5y ago
Unless it is a worldwide law, it won't matter except for reducing targeted attacks. For broad, automated attacks it isn't worth it to disable just for the US, that actually takes more work. They will just still have it encrypt the drive and then not bother trying to collect manually if it is in the US.
- hcurtiss 5y ago
  This is what treaties are for. To the degree the developed world took this position, it would radically reduce the incentive.
- Larrikin 5y ago
  They already hard code prevention for attacking Russia and other countries in the Russian sphere of influence so the code is already there.
- bluGill 5y ago
  The US is big enough and rich enough that that alone would make a major dent. "I Rob Banks Because That’s Where the Money Is" (https://quoteinvestigator.com/2013/02/10/where-money-is/ https://quoteinvestigator.com/2013/02/10/where-money-is/ for investigation) When there is no money in it they won't do it. Even if that doesn't work, the US alone will ensure that a lot more effort is put into prevention. If you can't pay a ransom anymore, then after a few high profile major losses companies will take security and backups more seriously which will make it even harder to attack anything - this will then be rolled out to the rest of the world because once you make good tools you may as well.
adminscoffee 5y ago
for soft criminals, the hard ones will take it as more exciting and things will get worse. the real question we should be asking is why people are doing this and where or what country are they aligned with, is it some random kid who thinks it's all a game or is it an actual state sponsored criminal network?

cma 5y ago

Unless it is a worldwide law, it won't matter except for reducing targeted attacks. For broad, automated attacks it isn't worth it to disable just for the US, that actually takes more work. They will just still have it encrypt the drive and then not bother trying to collect manually if it is in the US.

hcurtiss 5y ago
This is what treaties are for. To the degree the developed world took this position, it would radically reduce the incentive.
Larrikin 5y ago
They already hard code prevention for attacking Russia and other countries in the Russian sphere of influence so the code is already there.
bluGill 5y ago
The US is big enough and rich enough that that alone would make a major dent. "I Rob Banks Because That’s Where the Money Is" (https://quoteinvestigator.com/2013/02/10/where-money-is/ https://quoteinvestigator.com/2013/02/10/where-money-is/ for investigation) When there is no money in it they won't do it. Even if that doesn't work, the US alone will ensure that a lot more effort is put into prevention. If you can't pay a ransom anymore, then after a few high profile major losses companies will take security and backups more seriously which will make it even harder to attack anything - this will then be rolled out to the rest of the world because once you make good tools you may as well.

adminscoffee 5y ago

for soft criminals, the hard ones will take it as more exciting and things will get worse. the real question we should be asking is why people are doing this and where or what country are they aligned with, is it some random kid who thinks it's all a game or is it an actual state sponsored criminal network?