The only case in which ransomware seems actually similar to hostage taking is when a hospital or something is hit. And I think that is actually a morally complicated situation, because lives are actually at risk.

Otherwise ransomware payments are just a collective action problem, paying them builds this harmful ransomware industry, but might be cheaper than losing or restoring your data. Making it costlier to pay the ransomware groups is a great strategy, in the sense that even if it isn’t perfect it might bump some cases from “pay” to “don’t pay,” damaging the industry.