Re:US-led coalition of nations agrees to end ransomware paym...
by bee_rider on Tuesday October 31, 2023 @01:33PM
(#38088431)
I think ransomware is not really like drugs or hostages.
For drugs, there’s some inherent desire for some people to consume them. Maybe they harm society a bit (in the sense that they might destroy the people that take them), but the main cost for the rest of us is that they fund criminal enterprises because they are illegal. People want drugs, if they could buy them at CVS I suspect they would.
Ransomware is already illegal, we don’t create a new criminal enterprise by making it illegal to do business with them, we just make it harder.
Also, lots go the biggest ransomware gets have been big institutional entities where everything is documented. People just buy drugs in small amounts and consume them, two parties, neither of whom wants to get caught, minimal paper trail. Basically impossible to ban.
For physical hostages—people are desperate to get their friends and family back, and so they’ll go to desperate measures to pay. For ransomware, it is usually an economic decision, nobody’s life is at risk (other than when, like, a hospital is hit). Increasing the cost increases the chance the decision will go the other way. And increases the incentives to keep IT defenses up to date. (I know you didn’t bring up the hostage analogy, I think it is worth noting that the desperation you point to here is really an artifact of the tangent we’re on from the analogy leading us astray).
For drugs, there’s some inherent desire for some people to consume them. Maybe they harm society a bit (in the sense that they might destroy the people that take them), but the main cost for the rest of us is that they fund criminal enterprises because they are illegal. People want drugs, if they could buy them at CVS I suspect they would.
Ransomware is already illegal, we don’t create a new criminal enterprise by making it illegal to do business with them, we just make it harder.
Also, lots go the biggest ransomware gets have been big institutional entities where everything is documented. People just buy drugs in small amounts and consume them, two parties, neither of whom wants to get caught, minimal paper trail. Basically impossible to ban.
For physical hostages—people are desperate to get their friends and family back, and so they’ll go to desperate measures to pay. For ransomware, it is usually an economic decision, nobody’s life is at risk (other than when, like, a hospital is hit). Increasing the cost increases the chance the decision will go the other way. And increases the incentives to keep IT defenses up to date. (I know you didn’t bring up the hostage analogy, I think it is worth noting that the desperation you point to here is really an artifact of the tangent we’re on from the analogy leading us astray).