US travel firm $4.5M ransom negotiation open chat • Hacker News Board

Re: US travel firm $4.5M ransom negotiation open chat

#121

Post by henriquemaia » Mon, Aug 03, 2020, 2:12 AM UTC

momokoko wrote: post #92

Let this be a lesson to those that say bitcoin and other cryptocurrency has no real value outside of speculation. This kind of attack would be almost impossible in the pre-bitcoin era. The difficulty of receiving that volume of money in that short of a period of time in a difficult to trace manner is a new thing. We are entering a new era where crime can pay in very large sums with orders of magnitude less complexity…

As with everything else, the internet serves as a kind of lense, amplifying whatever underlies it to orders of magnitude unimaginable. It doesn't matter if it's a random bit of information on a encyclopedia (wiki) or cybercrime. If it can be scaled up, it will be scaled up.

Re: US travel firm $4.5M ransom negotiation open chat

#122

Post by garmaine » Mon, Aug 03, 2020, 2:12 AM UTC

yyyk wrote: post #120

momokoko wrote: post #92

Let this be a lesson to those that say bitcoin and other cryptocurrency has no real value outside of speculation. This kind of attack would be almost impossible in the pre-bitcoin era. The difficulty of receiving that volume of money in that short of a period of time in a difficult to trace manner is a new thing. We are entering a new era where crime can pay in very large sums with orders of magnitude less complexity…

>Let this be a lesson to those that say bitcoin and other cryptocurrency has no real value outside of speculation. >This kind of attack would be almost impossible in the pre-bitcoin era.... Instead democratizing currency, we're democratizing large scale crime. Just wanted to make this same point - right now, cryptocurrency has negative value for society. Perhaps this is a justification for banning the current impleme…

Banning... how?

Re: US travel firm $4.5M ransom negotiation open chat

#123

Post by 9nGQluzmnq3M » Mon, Aug 03, 2020, 2:12 AM UTC

teruakohatu wrote: post #91

9nGQluzmnq3M wrote: post #81

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Low. The hackers are likely European, since there are telltales like European number formatting ("10.000.000$") and awkward phrases like "make a step forward" (perhaps Italian fare un passo avanti ?).

Would you really expect state sponsored hackers to drop references to Korea? They are either European and don't mind anyone knowing, Europeans who accidently dropped hints, or not European and want people to think they are.

Hypothesis A: These are European hackers.

Hypothesis B: There are North Korean hackers who have mastered English, an enemy language whose speakers they have almost no interactive exposure to, to such an extent that they can, in real time, simulate the subtle mannerisms of another, completely unrelated set of non-native speakers of English.

Take your pick.

Re: US travel firm $4.5M ransom negotiation open chat

#124

Post by seebetter » Mon, Aug 03, 2020, 2:13 AM UTC

wayoutthere wrote: post #101

drdaeman wrote: post #99

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Not kind of a context I'd like to be associated with a cryptocurrency, though. Privacy is great, but I'd rather prefer people of thinking of that property associated with buying online porn (or whatever legal) than paying online ransoms.

For better or worse, you can look at the current price of Bitcoin as an options contract on future criminal activity.

That's analogous to saying, "For better or worse, you can look at Robinhood's stock price as an options contract on future insider trading." It's meaningless unless you consider wild west financial speculation and traders as criminal activity.

Re: US travel firm $4.5M ransom negotiation open chat

#125

Post by darcys22 » Mon, Aug 03, 2020, 2:13 AM UTC

dmead wrote: post #119

momokoko wrote: post #92

Let this be a lesson to those that say bitcoin and other cryptocurrency has no real value outside of speculation. This kind of attack would be almost impossible in the pre-bitcoin era. The difficulty of receiving that volume of money in that short of a period of time in a difficult to trace manner is a new thing. We are entering a new era where crime can pay in very large sums with orders of magnitude less complexity…

my understanding of bitcoin is that it's just used to back the drug trade. the recent price spike, as all other price spikes are the result of some (probably) nefarious activity that pumps real dollars in and out of the bitcoin platform.

The recent price spike is from the lead up to Eth2.0

Re: US travel firm $4.5M ransom negotiation open chat

#126

Post by timavr » Mon, Aug 03, 2020, 2:14 AM UTC

nradov wrote: post #24

It should be a criminal offense punishable by prison time for companies to pay for ransomware keys. While that might cause some businesses to fail in the short term, it would benefit society as a whole by eliminating the financial incentive for such attacks.

It wouldn't work in this case. It will be similar to drug trade, where everything is hush hush and the price probably will go up. It will just push more innocent people into white colar crime.

You are running the company. You spend all your life getting to CEO position. And then boom breach and your company has massive loss, lawsuits and you are out of the job. Probably 9/10 CEO types will just engage in a crime to avoid that situation.

Current situation is way better. All breaches are public, prices are public, so the correct answer is to invest in security and if you get caught with your pants down, just pay the fee Let justice department handle it from that point on.

The way bank robberies are handled is the best. Just give them everything they ask for. In the end of the day it is either insured and even if it is not, it is stupid to risk anyones life for money created in fractional-reserve banking system.

Re: US travel firm $4.5M ransom negotiation open chat

#127

Post by imglorp » Mon, Aug 03, 2020, 2:15 AM UTC

Another windows local admin/group/domain thing. When are IT departments going to take it off their networks? Why have LANs at all, for most back office work?

Immutable, versioned files in managed cloud storage eliminates the locker threat (not the disclosure one though).

Re: US travel firm $4.5M ransom negotiation open chat

#128

Post by josu » Mon, Aug 03, 2020, 2:15 AM UTC

momokoko wrote: post #92

Let this be a lesson to those that say bitcoin and other cryptocurrency has no real value outside of speculation. This kind of attack would be almost impossible in the pre-bitcoin era. The difficulty of receiving that volume of money in that short of a period of time in a difficult to trace manner is a new thing. We are entering a new era where crime can pay in very large sums with orders of magnitude less complexity…

Yeah, same issue with Nobel inventing the dynamite. Just because some people are going to use it for unethical purposes, it doesn't mean that we have to stop the advance of science and technology. Besides, it seems that Bitcoin was inevitable, the internet needs its own decentralized currency.

Re: US travel firm $4.5M ransom negotiation open chat

#129

Post by garbagetime » Mon, Aug 03, 2020, 2:15 AM UTC

seebetter wrote: post #115

momokoko wrote: post #92

Let this be a lesson to those that say bitcoin and other cryptocurrency has no real value outside of speculation. This kind of attack would be almost impossible in the pre-bitcoin era. The difficulty of receiving that volume of money in that short of a period of time in a difficult to trace manner is a new thing. We are entering a new era where crime can pay in very large sums with orders of magnitude less complexity…

Something like 95%+ of bitcoin is related to financial speculation, investing, DeFi etc etc. An order of magnitude of more drugs are sold on Cash App and Venmo -- which is why they're in rap songs. As for large scale hacking, extortion and ransom, yes bitcoin is used but it is increasing difficult to cash out in a large way.

>it is increasing difficult to cash out in a large way

It is actually difficult to cash out?

Re: US travel firm $4.5M ransom negotiation open chat

#130

Post by kortilla » Mon, Aug 03, 2020, 2:16 AM UTC

yyyk wrote: post #120

momokoko wrote: post #92

Let this be a lesson to those that say bitcoin and other cryptocurrency has no real value outside of speculation. This kind of attack would be almost impossible in the pre-bitcoin era. The difficulty of receiving that volume of money in that short of a period of time in a difficult to trace manner is a new thing. We are entering a new era where crime can pay in very large sums with orders of magnitude less complexity…

>Let this be a lesson to those that say bitcoin and other cryptocurrency has no real value outside of speculation. >This kind of attack would be almost impossible in the pre-bitcoin era.... Instead democratizing currency, we're democratizing large scale crime. Just wanted to make this same point - right now, cryptocurrency has negative value for society. Perhaps this is a justification for banning the current impleme…

Not sure how you arrived at a negative value. Or are you suggesting there is no positive use-case that could offset it?