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GoodWill ransomware forces victims to donate to the poor

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Re: GoodWill ransomware forces victims to donate to the poor

#51
post #5

Hah, Black Mirror-esque. But well, hopefully it has a IP filter to not hit countries with universal healthcare. /s And asking stranger kids "Hey kids, want some KFC?"... that should go well. "The hacker 4chan made me do it!"

Even in countries with universal healthcare, people regularly can't afford treatment because expensive treatments aren't included.

My grandma got a million dollar cancer treatment over a few years, multiple surgeries, chemos, meds, dozens of appointments.

We paid for TV and parking(and we could have gotten free taxis to the hospital/doctors appointments but she didn't want to ride with a stranger...)

Are you talking about 3rd world countries?

Re: GoodWill ransomware forces victims to donate to the poor

#52

I assumed the "goodwill" would be a donation to an association that would be a front for the hackers to get the money somehow, but it seems that it's really acts of goodwill with no real money flowing, so maybe the hackers actually believe they're doing good ?

I mean charities could open up crypto accounts; since it's a public ledger, the ransomware operators would be able to see the transaction.

There are charities who accept donations in crypto. We donated future royalties on secondary sales for some of the things we did at SXSW to Action against hunger for one example.

Re: GoodWill ransomware forces victims to donate to the poor

#53
post #10

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> And asking stranger kids "Hey kids, want some KFC?"... This is not donating to the poor.

While the action may look creepy and KFCs definitely not the healthiest choice, it is donating. You are donating food to someone hungry.

You’re probably just helping poor people acquire diabetes faster. In the USA poor people are more likely to be fat suggesting food access is not a problem.

Re: GoodWill ransomware forces victims to donate to the poor

#55
post #17

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What kind of treatments? How regularly?

> What kind of treatments? How regularly? In the UK there is a department called NICE which uses health economics to understand how to best utilize the funding for the national health service to best improve health outcomes (generally measured by increasing QALY or Quality-Adjusted Life Years, but there are multiple measures in reality). This means that if there is a £500k treatment that could save the lives of a 70…

It's worth mentioning that in the UK you can still pay for private treatment, and thus avoid any queues. You can also buy insurance to pay for private treatment.

A few countries forbid this, including Canada.

Re: GoodWill ransomware forces victims to donate to the poor

#56
post #23

Can I assume that the author of this ransomware is American or at least is very immersed in American culture? Because the activities listed sound very America-centric. I've never seen someone actually sleeping roadside in the cold, and since we have universal healthcare, I've also not heard of someone dying in the hospital because their loved ones couldn't gather up enough money. I guess I might as well just smash my…

>I've also not heard of someone dying in the hospital because their loved ones couldn't gather up enough money Am from a country with universal health care. It's not uncommon to die waiting for treatment or there simply not being any way to get the treatment in my country. Raising money to visit the US for treatment is a pretty common thing here as a result.

And in the USA if you don’t have insurance and are dying you’ll be treated. They act like dead poor people are piled up outside of hospitals. They’ll even discount you to 0 if they see you’re really poor.

Re: GoodWill ransomware forces victims to donate to the poor

#58
post #32
post #6

I was expecting them to want you to make a donation and send the receipt, but they want you to actually round up less fortunate kids and take them out for pizza. Bizarre.

Its definitely a cultural thing. The task would be extremely easy in any Indian city, but they probably don’t realize it would be near impossible in the West. Same with task 3, it would bankrupt Americans to pay for somebody else’s medical bills.

Or task 3 would also be impossible in a country with universal health care.
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