I don't think it is about morals, but more about avoiding trouble.

And I also wouldn't find it too hard to believe that there must be at least some ransomware groups with morals. Not the same as yours, sure

When you hit a national security target, you get NSA and CIA after you. They have vast resources to make your life difficult wherever you are.

On the other hand, why shouldn't NSA and CIA be invested 100% in pushing back on these attacks already? The potential harm from this vector is obviously gigantic, so why wait for a really significant attack to happen?

Ransomware make private sector aware of security issues and resilient against attacks. It’s like developing antibodies to viruses.

NSA rather not to interfere, unless infrastructure is involved.

Interference from public sector may actually not be successful in the long run, as companies simply adjust to that, and keep ignoring security at a new equilibrium level.

Not suggesting you're doing this, but their existence should still not be framed as positive. They are malicious and sophisticated, and should be pursued accordingly. If they're willing to extort others by holding their data ransom, there's no telling what else they may be willing to do.

But yes, ransomware does lead to a hardening of network infrastructure, and reduces the likelihood of successful espionage operations, by alerting parties - via the ransomware attack - to security vulnerabilities.

> On the other hand, why shouldn't NSA and CIA be invested 100% in pushing back on these attacks already?

For the same reason that neither them, nor the Army doesn't serve drug warrants, or investigate tax evasion. Because policing is not their mandate. That's the job of either your local police department, or the FBI, or any one of a number of the other federal police forces.

If ransomware gangs are seen as a potential threat to national security, wouldn't preemptive action against these groups fall under the claimed remit of the NSA or CIA?

Tax evasion is a potential threat to national security, drugs are a potential threat to national security, protests are a potential threat to national security, q-anonsense is a potential threat to national security, especially when it culminates in an invasion of the Capitol.

You don't just get to sprinkle 'potential threat to national security' to turn criminal activity into a problem for the extra-judicial arms of your government. How about we let the police do their core competency - policing, and the military and the spooks to stick to their core competency - extra-judicial violence, and kidnapping random people to hold/torture without trial in Gitmo.

I'm not doing any such thing, hence the phrasing of my comment.

Your comment seems to imply you think the most/all of the remit of the CIA is or should be invalid. That position doesn't contradict my comment in any way.

That is a rather different claim than saying that premptively pursuing ransomware gangs in other countries is outside what the relevant decision makers view as the remit of the CIA. To me it seems to clearly fall in-line with their historic actions (as long as the cyber ransomers are outside of the country.)

The target was a different university, and when the scammers realized their mistake they handed over the encryption keys.

I wouldn't say morals play no role, since someone that is perfectly fine robbing a wealthy institution isn't automatically going to be OK with causing someone's death, but there absolutely is risk management at play since the hunt for someone that stole a few hundred thousand dollars is going to be much lower priority than a hunt for a killer.

An investgation later revealed that the patient's death was not caused by the ransomware attack, and the patient would've died regardless.

Not at all suggesting they have morals. I'm suggesting it makes business sense to avoid targeting hospitals. Because people will come after you much harder if you do that too often.

If the NSA starts deploying the TAO against ransomware crews, the crews are going to have a much MUCH harder time actually making money.

Surely any ransomware attack is coldhearted? It's only effective if you are threatening something the target really cares about.

Was robin hood coldhearted? I certainly don't mean to suggest any ransomware group has motivations that noble, but I don't think you can generally say that

A better question: was Robin Hood a real person whose behavior could serve as evidence?

does it matter if it's just used as a counterexample to make a point while speaking in general terms?

Absolutely. Theft is violence and it's morally wrong no matter the circumstances. It doesn't matter if you're stealing a piece of bread not to starve, if you're stealing the money to save the lives of orphans, to help the homeless or pay for hospitals. It doesn't matter if you're an individual, a dictator's army or a democratically elected government.

Theft is theft.

Doesn't mean it's morally wrong. Robin Hood was taking back and returning what was stolen from peasants by the Sheriff (and other nobles) by overtaxation and straight up "this is mine now" antics. These were people that had no right to what they were taking. If beat the crap out of the guy I ran down after he stole my garden gnome that's justice of a sort.

Are you arguing that stealing bread to not starve is cold-hearted? That attitude may not he illegal, but it is way more cold-hearted than stealing bread to prevent starvation.

As for the comparison to Robin Hood, that would only be apt if the ransomware only targeted exploitative companies and gave the money back to the victims of those companies.