6 ms·

So there's that woman I follow who used to work in hostage and ransom negotiation business, and she's adamant there's no such thing as "no negotiations with ter

by varjag 3y ago

So there's that woman I follow who used to work in hostage and ransom negotiation business, and she's adamant there's no such thing as "no negotiations with terrorists" no matter public rhetoric or legislation. When push comes to shove, side channels and loopholes are inevitably found and third party contractors like her are getting hired. I strongly suspect this too will end up mostly a jurisdiction/accounting nuance rather than a substantial change.

hfuyf65 3y ago
[dead]
salamanderss 3y ago
It wouldn't surprise me if places like Nigeria have a bunch of semi-whitewashed English speaking faces/voices to perform this kind of grey area work. Even better if some of their family is part of a hostage taking gang so they can burn the candle from both ends.
- boeingUH60 3y ago
  Nigeria (my country) is pretty bad, but we don't do ransomware, lol.
  - salamanderss 3y ago
    I responded to a comment on hostage and ransom negotiation business. Hostages aren't normally considered ransomware, although said negotiators would have excellent overlapping skill set. Travel.gov has an advisory for hostage taking in your country. I can assure you there are well spoken negotiators in your nation to deal with that.
    - nerdypirate 3y ago
      I'm afraid, you are wrong, criminal gangs or masterminds are not that organized in Nigeria
      - salamanderss 3y ago
        Cool here's a documentary with an English speaking hostage negotiator in Nigeria with family in the other side of the business (talks start around 4:30). I'm afraid, YOU are wrong. My opinion wasn't idle thought but derived from research on Nigeria rather than some weird borderline racist baseless rhetoric that Nigerians don't have this level of organization. https://youtube.com/watch?v=nG09Bo3uvAw https://youtube.com/watch?v=nG09Bo3uvAw
        edgyquant 3y ago
        Didn’t vice catch a bunch of flack for over sensationalizing their “reporting?” Regardless I’d be more inclined to believe an actual Nigerian than a YouTube video. That person didn’t say there were zero people doing this, they said it wasn’t likely Nigeria had a widespread and systemic issue with organized crime doing this.
        salamanderss 3y ago
        Cool let's deconstruct: >Didn’t vice catch a bunch of flack for over sensationalizing their “reporting?” Awesome ad hominem against the people recording actual Nigerians testimony. >Regardless I’d be more inclined to believe an actual Nigerian than a YouTube video And I provide video with actual Nigerians yet it's crickets from you when some guy just flippantly says I'm wrong with no supporting facts. Unless by actual Nigerians you want one to jump through the screen and talk to us... we're going to have to settle for electronic communication. It's what worth noting the Nigerian commenter above denied ransomware related activities but never denied the rest. >That person didn’t say there were zero people doing this, they said it wasn’t likely Nigeria had a widespread and systemic issue with organized crime doing this. They said what they said, not what you've retranslated them to say. I never said the issue was systemic, but if they really said that then their flippant dismissal was just as invalid as they'd be addressing a strawman.
      - costco 3y ago
        Except a few billion a year in gift card, business email compromise, and romance scams. But yeah, Nigeria is not really a ransomware source country.
JumpCrisscross 3y ago
One, this article is not about banning crypto ransom. Two, if you wanted to do that, you’d criminalise it with the threat of sanctions. At that point your K&R retiree and anyone who signed off on paying them would be fugitives in almost anywhere in the world.
- varjag 3y ago
  As long as you have a non-signatory among otherwise first world nations (and there's always a handful on any treaty) there absolutely will be a legal way that you can't do much about.
  - JumpCrisscross 3y ago
    > there absolutely will be a legal way that you can't do much about No, that’s what the sanctions threat is for. It may be possible. But now you’re in the company of money launderers and terrorism financiers. To be clear, I don’t think this is necessary. But it’s naïve to imagine it’s beyond D.C.’s capacity.
    - bombcar 3y ago
      DC doesn't go after these "security consulting firms located in non-signatory states" just precisely because they want to be able to use them if the need arises.
      - JumpCrisscross 3y ago
        > DC doesn't go after these "security consulting firms located in non-signatory states" just precisely because they want to be able to use them You are vastly overestimating the federal government’s coherence and coördination. Yes, we use black hats. Yes, we still jail and sanction them.
        bostik 3y ago
        Which is straight out of Macchiavelli's playbook. The first thing you do after conquering the throne is to bundle up all your pending atrocities in one and eliminate competition. The second thing you do is slaughter the mercenaries you had hired to win your war of ascension. No reason to leave them around and let the next usurper hire them to dethrone you.
DavidPeiffer 3y ago
>...there's no such thing as "no negotiations with terrorists" no matter public rhetoric or legislation. I've heard this as well. A professor was flying into a less than stable area or Afghanistan and for some reason they were descending just like a normal commercial flight. "What are you doing, we're going to get shot down!". He was used to a steep descent or a spiral to the runway to minimize the risk of getting hit. They then explained they had a deal with the local warlord. The military provided barrels of used oil from all their ground vehicles, and in exchange they don't fire on the airplanes as they takeoff or land. The warlord burns the oil for heating, and the military doesn't need to deal with (hopefully correctly) disposing of large quantities of used oil.
- gnfargbl 3y ago
  You have to wonder how much of that transaction is saving face? The warlord doesn't have to deal with the messy business of trying to shoot down jets belonging to a well-funded army; the military doesn't have to deal with the difficult business of engaging a warlord with local connections and support. Both sides get to wink and imply that they each got the better end of a "business deal". It's Clausewitz in reverse -- commerce as a de-escalation of war by other means.
  - savanaly 3y ago
    It's the Coase theorem [0] in action! No matter what the laws may or may not be against shooting down planes, the socially efficient outcome of planes not being shot down was arrived at through negotiation. [0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Coase_theorem https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Coase_theorem
  - ozfive 3y ago
    Shall we get into the great vowel shift of 1450?
- filoleg 3y ago
  Ayup, another example I can remember of is that swedish professor who went ahead and hired services of a PMC to extract her grad student and his family from Iraq[0]. Background: the student vent to visit his family back in Iraq as his town was under an ISIS attack, which is how he ended up getting stuck there. 0. https://www.nbcnews.com/news/world/how-swedish-professor-helped-rescue-grad-student-isis-controlled-iraq-n947866 https://www.nbcnews.com/news/world/how-swedish-professor-hel...
nradov 3y ago
We should make it a criminal offense with severe penalties to pay any sort of ransom regardless of the consequences. Use the Foreign Corrupt Practices Act as a model. Even if it means hostages will die or businesses will be destroyed, that is an acceptable price to pay in order to cut off funding to terrorists and other criminals.
- diego_moita 3y ago
  > is an acceptable price to pay It is acceptable for you, since you won't suffer the consequences, the burden of damage isn't on you. It is similar to consuming drugs: when people buy meth they're helping the drug dealers. But they just can't help it, they're desperate. Despair is above reason. Laws are useless to stop desperate actions.
  - nradov 3y ago
    We're not talking about desperate drug addicts here. The threat of criminal prosecution and being sent to federal prison is a pretty effective deterrent for most people. Especially the corporate officers who would ultimately have to authorize any ransomware payment. They won't take that risk to help their employer.
    - goda90 3y ago
      You just said "hostages will die" in your first comment. Saving human life is a pretty desperate.
      - bombcar 3y ago
        And in those cases, there will likely be a relative willing to do the illegal step to save their relative. The only way to actually have a "hostages will die" policy is to ensure you destroy whoever took them, despite the deaths of hostages.
  - mensetmanusman 3y ago
    They are not useless, they bend the curve. Micro harms are everywhere.
rnk 3y ago
You should have pointed out that her view is self-serving. if you are a hostage negotiator (retired even or whatever), it's natural to argue that we will still negotiate with terrorists. Just like programmers argue about whether we'll still have a job even as ai gets better and better ;-)
- varjag 3y ago
  She's now an elementary school teacher so really doubt she has anything to sell.
  - KMag 3y ago
    As a father of 3, I can tell you elementary school teachers negotiate with terrorists on a daily basis.
    - rnk 3y ago
      Best comment of the year. Maybe she's hoping to be rescued if she can get her old job back without so much conflict ;-)
    - artisin 3y ago
      Perhaps it's time I hang up this old keyboard, rally together a ratpack of seasoned elementary school teachers, and swiftly bring an end to the Global War on Terror.
- Spivak 3y ago
  I mean "people still keep hiring me, even people who have a policy of not negotiating" is a pretty neutral take.
  - guerrilla 3y ago
    Umm, no. A well-known sales technique is inflating your own demand. There's no way to know whether she's telling the truth or doing that.
arbuge 3y ago
I suspect if this coalition of nations actually criminalized paying ransoms, that would go a long way towards closing up all those loopholes. Perhaps that is what needs to happen next.
- creer 3y ago
  Until a government organization or close enough public need arises where a new loophole would be created PDQ? Also "close all the loopholes" has a ridiculously poor record in law. On the one hand, people with no incentives, on the other people whose entire line of work is to extract the maximum result of whatever the law happens to be.
616c 3y ago
Any lawyer or cyber insurance rep can tell you yes it already exists, and it is called cyber insurance. Lol
- NoPicklez 3y ago
  Once you get into the nuts and bolts of cyber insurance you often find you aren't covered in that regard and it is becoming extremely expensive
wdr1 3y ago
Chris Voss, a former FBI hostage negotiator, discussed this policy on Lex Friedman's podcast. Here's the clip: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gm4hb5yNxyE https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gm4hb5yNxyE The policy has been widely misreported as "we don't negotiate with terrorists", which is wrong. The actual policy is we won't make concessions to terrorists.
- Maxious 3y ago
  The statement came from Reagan "there will be no negotiation with terrorists of any kind" https://www.reaganlibrary.gov/archives/speech/1980-ronald-reagan-and-jimmy-carter-presidential-debate https://www.reaganlibrary.gov/archives/speech/1980-ronald-re...
- ChrisRR 3y ago
  I'm sure the actual policy is "We tell the public one thing but on the battlefield is a different matter"

by varjag 3y ago

hfuyf65 3y ago

[dead]

salamanderss 3y ago

It wouldn't surprise me if places like Nigeria have a bunch of semi-whitewashed English speaking faces/voices to perform this kind of grey area work. Even better if some of their family is part of a hostage taking gang so they can burn the candle from both ends.

boeingUH60 3y ago
Nigeria (my country) is pretty bad, but we don't do ransomware, lol.
- salamanderss 3y ago
  I responded to a comment on hostage and ransom negotiation business. Hostages aren't normally considered ransomware, although said negotiators would have excellent overlapping skill set. Travel.gov has an advisory for hostage taking in your country. I can assure you there are well spoken negotiators in your nation to deal with that.
  - nerdypirate 3y ago
    I'm afraid, you are wrong, criminal gangs or masterminds are not that organized in Nigeria
    - salamanderss 3y ago
      Cool here's a documentary with an English speaking hostage negotiator in Nigeria with family in the other side of the business (talks start around 4:30). I'm afraid, YOU are wrong. My opinion wasn't idle thought but derived from research on Nigeria rather than some weird borderline racist baseless rhetoric that Nigerians don't have this level of organization. https://youtube.com/watch?v=nG09Bo3uvAw https://youtube.com/watch?v=nG09Bo3uvAw
      - edgyquant 3y ago
        Didn’t vice catch a bunch of flack for over sensationalizing their “reporting?” Regardless I’d be more inclined to believe an actual Nigerian than a YouTube video. That person didn’t say there were zero people doing this, they said it wasn’t likely Nigeria had a widespread and systemic issue with organized crime doing this.
        salamanderss 3y ago
        Cool let's deconstruct: >Didn’t vice catch a bunch of flack for over sensationalizing their “reporting?” Awesome ad hominem against the people recording actual Nigerians testimony. >Regardless I’d be more inclined to believe an actual Nigerian than a YouTube video And I provide video with actual Nigerians yet it's crickets from you when some guy just flippantly says I'm wrong with no supporting facts. Unless by actual Nigerians you want one to jump through the screen and talk to us... we're going to have to settle for electronic communication. It's what worth noting the Nigerian commenter above denied ransomware related activities but never denied the rest. >That person didn’t say there were zero people doing this, they said it wasn’t likely Nigeria had a widespread and systemic issue with organized crime doing this. They said what they said, not what you've retranslated them to say. I never said the issue was systemic, but if they really said that then their flippant dismissal was just as invalid as they'd be addressing a strawman.
    - costco 3y ago
      Except a few billion a year in gift card, business email compromise, and romance scams. But yeah, Nigeria is not really a ransomware source country.

JumpCrisscross 3y ago

One, this article is not about banning crypto ransom. Two, if you wanted to do that, you’d criminalise it with the threat of sanctions. At that point your K&R retiree and anyone who signed off on paying them would be fugitives in almost anywhere in the world.

varjag 3y ago
As long as you have a non-signatory among otherwise first world nations (and there's always a handful on any treaty) there absolutely will be a legal way that you can't do much about.
- JumpCrisscross 3y ago
  > there absolutely will be a legal way that you can't do much about No, that’s what the sanctions threat is for. It may be possible. But now you’re in the company of money launderers and terrorism financiers. To be clear, I don’t think this is necessary. But it’s naïve to imagine it’s beyond D.C.’s capacity.
  - bombcar 3y ago
    DC doesn't go after these "security consulting firms located in non-signatory states" just precisely because they want to be able to use them if the need arises.
    - JumpCrisscross 3y ago
      > DC doesn't go after these "security consulting firms located in non-signatory states" just precisely because they want to be able to use them You are vastly overestimating the federal government’s coherence and coördination. Yes, we use black hats. Yes, we still jail and sanction them.
      - bostik 3y ago
        Which is straight out of Macchiavelli's playbook. The first thing you do after conquering the throne is to bundle up all your pending atrocities in one and eliminate competition. The second thing you do is slaughter the mercenaries you had hired to win your war of ascension. No reason to leave them around and let the next usurper hire them to dethrone you.

DavidPeiffer 3y ago

>...there's no such thing as "no negotiations with terrorists" no matter public rhetoric or legislation. I've heard this as well. A professor was flying into a less than stable area or Afghanistan and for some reason they were descending just like a normal commercial flight. "What are you doing, we're going to get shot down!". He was used to a steep descent or a spiral to the runway to minimize the risk of getting hit. They then explained they had a deal with the local warlord. The military provided barrels of used oil from all their ground vehicles, and in exchange they don't fire on the airplanes as they takeoff or land. The warlord burns the oil for heating, and the military doesn't need to deal with (hopefully correctly) disposing of large quantities of used oil.

gnfargbl 3y ago
You have to wonder how much of that transaction is saving face? The warlord doesn't have to deal with the messy business of trying to shoot down jets belonging to a well-funded army; the military doesn't have to deal with the difficult business of engaging a warlord with local connections and support. Both sides get to wink and imply that they each got the better end of a "business deal". It's Clausewitz in reverse -- commerce as a de-escalation of war by other means.
- savanaly 3y ago
  It's the Coase theorem [0] in action! No matter what the laws may or may not be against shooting down planes, the socially efficient outcome of planes not being shot down was arrived at through negotiation. [0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Coase_theorem https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Coase_theorem
- ozfive 3y ago
  Shall we get into the great vowel shift of 1450?
filoleg 3y ago
Ayup, another example I can remember of is that swedish professor who went ahead and hired services of a PMC to extract her grad student and his family from Iraq[0]. Background: the student vent to visit his family back in Iraq as his town was under an ISIS attack, which is how he ended up getting stuck there. 0. https://www.nbcnews.com/news/world/how-swedish-professor-helped-rescue-grad-student-isis-controlled-iraq-n947866 https://www.nbcnews.com/news/world/how-swedish-professor-hel...

nradov 3y ago

We should make it a criminal offense with severe penalties to pay any sort of ransom regardless of the consequences. Use the Foreign Corrupt Practices Act as a model. Even if it means hostages will die or businesses will be destroyed, that is an acceptable price to pay in order to cut off funding to terrorists and other criminals.

diego_moita 3y ago
> is an acceptable price to pay It is acceptable for you, since you won't suffer the consequences, the burden of damage isn't on you. It is similar to consuming drugs: when people buy meth they're helping the drug dealers. But they just can't help it, they're desperate. Despair is above reason. Laws are useless to stop desperate actions.
- nradov 3y ago
  We're not talking about desperate drug addicts here. The threat of criminal prosecution and being sent to federal prison is a pretty effective deterrent for most people. Especially the corporate officers who would ultimately have to authorize any ransomware payment. They won't take that risk to help their employer.
  - goda90 3y ago
    You just said "hostages will die" in your first comment. Saving human life is a pretty desperate.
    - bombcar 3y ago
      And in those cases, there will likely be a relative willing to do the illegal step to save their relative. The only way to actually have a "hostages will die" policy is to ensure you destroy whoever took them, despite the deaths of hostages.
- mensetmanusman 3y ago
  They are not useless, they bend the curve. Micro harms are everywhere.

rnk 3y ago

You should have pointed out that her view is self-serving. if you are a hostage negotiator (retired even or whatever), it's natural to argue that we will still negotiate with terrorists. Just like programmers argue about whether we'll still have a job even as ai gets better and better ;-)

varjag 3y ago
She's now an elementary school teacher so really doubt she has anything to sell.
- KMag 3y ago
  As a father of 3, I can tell you elementary school teachers negotiate with terrorists on a daily basis.
  - rnk 3y ago
    Best comment of the year. Maybe she's hoping to be rescued if she can get her old job back without so much conflict ;-)
  - artisin 3y ago
    Perhaps it's time I hang up this old keyboard, rally together a ratpack of seasoned elementary school teachers, and swiftly bring an end to the Global War on Terror.
Spivak 3y ago
I mean "people still keep hiring me, even people who have a policy of not negotiating" is a pretty neutral take.
- guerrilla 3y ago
  Umm, no. A well-known sales technique is inflating your own demand. There's no way to know whether she's telling the truth or doing that.

arbuge 3y ago

I suspect if this coalition of nations actually criminalized paying ransoms, that would go a long way towards closing up all those loopholes. Perhaps that is what needs to happen next.

creer 3y ago
Until a government organization or close enough public need arises where a new loophole would be created PDQ? Also "close all the loopholes" has a ridiculously poor record in law. On the one hand, people with no incentives, on the other people whose entire line of work is to extract the maximum result of whatever the law happens to be.

616c 3y ago

Any lawyer or cyber insurance rep can tell you yes it already exists, and it is called cyber insurance. Lol

NoPicklez 3y ago
Once you get into the nuts and bolts of cyber insurance you often find you aren't covered in that regard and it is becoming extremely expensive

wdr1 3y ago

Chris Voss, a former FBI hostage negotiator, discussed this policy on Lex Friedman's podcast. Here's the clip: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gm4hb5yNxyE https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gm4hb5yNxyE The policy has been widely misreported as "we don't negotiate with terrorists", which is wrong. The actual policy is we won't make concessions to terrorists.

Maxious 3y ago
The statement came from Reagan "there will be no negotiation with terrorists of any kind" https://www.reaganlibrary.gov/archives/speech/1980-ronald-reagan-and-jimmy-carter-presidential-debate https://www.reaganlibrary.gov/archives/speech/1980-ronald-re...
ChrisRR 3y ago
I'm sure the actual policy is "We tell the public one thing but on the battlefield is a different matter"