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ProtonMail pays $6k ransom, gets taken out by DDoS anyway

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Re: ProtonMail pays $6k ransom, gets taken out by DDoS anyway

#161

Post by JupiterMoon »

nugga wrote: post #153
JupiterMoon wrote: post #152

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I seriously doubt that the "let's fight" option was anywhere near the table when India gained independence. The records will all be public by now. > As for Britain giving up its ownership: To this date formally England lays claim to a whole bunch of places that they have colonized and in some cases it has gone to war to keep that situation as it is. Examples in post Suez history include?

He's probably talking about Malvinas (Falklands) among other places.

The Falklands are not a colonial story (unless you count the Argentinian desire to conquer them against the wishes of their citizens).

Any actual places?

Re: ProtonMail pays $6k ransom, gets taken out by DDoS anyway

#162

Post by ekianjo »

jacquesm wrote: post #100
SHIT_TALKER wrote: post #95

Earlier quoted context omitted.

When you are weak, you take what you can get. It was much better to have been colonized by the British, who actually had an interest in nation-building and respect for law and human rights (to the extent they deemed their subjects capable of handling them), than, say, to have become the personal fiefdom of Leopold II of Belgium.

That's a false dichotomy if there ever was one. The alternative to being colonized by the British was not to be colonized by Belgium but not to be colonized at all.

> was not to be colonized by Belgium but not to be colonized at all.

There was no such alternative if you were a weak, divided nation in the first place. Please look at what happened in other places with a similar situation (even China during a long time). Once the European nations stopped fighting each other they looked for other territories to conquer at the time - and this, by the way, not limited the the recent world history at all. Territorial conquest is something that started that was documented even in Antiquity, although we did not call it colonization then.

Most countries have been colonized many times and there's almost no connection nowadays between the actual "natives" and whoever is currently ruling.

Re: ProtonMail pays $6k ransom, gets taken out by DDoS anyway

#163

Post by michaelt »

tim333 wrote: post #144
jacquesm wrote: post #66

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's naive. If you pay a ransom they'll be back shortly for more. You've just turned yourself into an ATM for your attackers.

I was thinking in part of the pirate activities off Somalia. Most ship owners were better off paying $1m than losing a boat worth say $50m. The problem seems to have slacked off now and I feel it was more related to firearms being pointed in the direction of the pirates than people not paying. Likewise with Cryptolocker putting Evgeniy Bogachev in jail rather than on various yachts would be a start. http://www.usatod…

To run an effective extortion racket you don't just have to convince your victims that they will be hurt if they don't pay - you also have to prove that they won't be hurt if they do pay.

There wouldn't be any point in paying a $1m ransom for a $50m boat if it was going to get caught by 49 other pirate groups on its way to safety. So when a ransom has been paid, pirates escort a boat to safety.

DDOSers can't offer any such guarantee; it's not like one DDOSer can stop another going after the same victim. And to my knowledge there aren't any websites where victims can post reviews saying whether the same DDOSer targeted them again later on.

Re: ProtonMail pays $6k ransom, gets taken out by DDoS anyway

#164

Post by dorfsmay »

hocuspocus wrote: post #54
jacquesm wrote: post #15

NEVER EVER PAY RANSOM MONEY. Please. Even if your business will suffer it will suffer a lot more if you do pay since now it is known you'll cave. Also: you are making the problem larger for others.

From their blog: https://protonmaildotcom.wordpress.com/ At around 2PM, the attackers began directly attacking the infrastructure of our upstream providers and the datacenter itself. The coordinated assault on our ISP exceeded 100Gbps and attacked not only the datacenter, but also routers in Zurich, Frankfurt, and other locations where our ISP has nodes. This coordinated assault on key infrastructure eventually manag…

So if you start following what flows out of that bitcoin account, couldn't you find out who it benefits?

Re: ProtonMail pays $6k ransom, gets taken out by DDoS anyway

#165

Post by pjc50 »

SeanDav wrote: post #137
Estragon wrote: post #113

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I guess Kipling's knowledge of this had a practical basis, since he was one of the chief apologists for the systematic extortion the British Empire used to enrich itself.

(Note - I am from one of the countries invaded and occupied by Britain) I must come to Britain's defence here - it's behaviour was normal in those times but it did eventually give up most of its "ownership" without actually being defeated in wars. That was pretty amazing. By modern standards, British behaviour was despicable, but a lot of the invaded countries got enormous benefits - rule of law, economic infrastruct…

Indeed, it could have been worse, such as being colonised by the Belgians, who were (by some estimates) more genocidal than the Nazis.

Re: ProtonMail pays $6k ransom, gets taken out by DDoS anyway

#166

Post by brianwawok »

skybrian wrote: post #106
rcurry wrote: post #32

It is always a temptation to an armed and agile nation To call upon a neighbour and to say: -- "We invaded you last night--we are quite prepared to fight, Unless you pay us cash to go away." And that is called asking for Dane-geld, And the people who ask it explain That you've only to pay 'em the Dane-geld And then you'll get rid of the Dane! It is always a temptation for a rich and lazy nation, To puff and look impo…

Sometimes this is good advice. For some rather vivid counterexamples, read up on Genghis Khan. Computer security is of course a whole different thing.

The wrath of the Khans was amazing.

Seemed like your odds of dying were pretty high either way. Give him all your stuff and starve. Or say no and get beheaded..

Re: ProtonMail pays $6k ransom, gets taken out by DDoS anyway

#167

Post by TazeTSchnitzel »

SeanDav wrote: post #137
Estragon wrote: post #113

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I guess Kipling's knowledge of this had a practical basis, since he was one of the chief apologists for the systematic extortion the British Empire used to enrich itself.

(Note - I am from one of the countries invaded and occupied by Britain) I must come to Britain's defence here - it's behaviour was normal in those times but it did eventually give up most of its "ownership" without actually being defeated in wars. That was pretty amazing. By modern standards, British behaviour was despicable, but a lot of the invaded countries got enormous benefits - rule of law, economic infrastruct…

> I must come to Britain's defence here - it's behaviour was normal in those times

Yes, all of Europe was engaging in the monster known as colonialism.

That doesn't make it any less morally repugnant.

> it did eventually give up most of its "ownership" without actually being defeated in wars

It gave up its ownership only after being devastated by two World Wars.

> By modern standards, British behaviour was despicable, but a lot of the invaded countries got enormous benefits - rule of law, economic infrastructure, transport networks etc.

None of these things couldn't have been achieved without the British. And all these things came with a cost.

This justification has been used for colonialism time and time again. We saw this last year in Ukraine. It doesn't make it right.

Re: ProtonMail pays $6k ransom, gets taken out by DDoS anyway

#169

Post by notahacker »

nugga wrote: post #153
JupiterMoon wrote: post #152

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I seriously doubt that the "let's fight" option was anywhere near the table when India gained independence. The records will all be public by now. > As for Britain giving up its ownership: To this date formally England lays claim to a whole bunch of places that they have colonized and in some cases it has gone to war to keep that situation as it is. Examples in post Suez history include?

He's probably talking about Malvinas (Falklands) among other places.

If the Falklands had actually had any native inhabitants at the time it was "colonised", and the UK's military involvement hadn't been at the behest of the Falklands' contemporary native inhabitants to repel an invading foreign military dictatorship, they might have had more of a point...

"Other places" do not exist unless you name them. Even the Chagos Islands, the UK's most questionable overseas possession, have only been fought over in the courts.

Re: ProtonMail pays $6k ransom, gets taken out by DDoS anyway

#170

Post by nashashmi »

SeanDav wrote: post #137
Estragon wrote: post #113

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I guess Kipling's knowledge of this had a practical basis, since he was one of the chief apologists for the systematic extortion the British Empire used to enrich itself.

(Note - I am from one of the countries invaded and occupied by Britain) I must come to Britain's defence here - it's behaviour was normal in those times but it did eventually give up most of its "ownership" without actually being defeated in wars. That was pretty amazing. By modern standards, British behaviour was despicable, but a lot of the invaded countries got enormous benefits - rule of law, economic infrastruct…

> a lot of the invaded countries got enormous benefits

Those "benefits" stopped innovation and progress of their own cultures. And it led to the present day of conflict between traditionalists and progressives, slowing harmonious progress indefinitely. The traditionalists would have eventually progressed to a more "civil" society in a different way. And then we would have a far richer diversity than today's system.

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