As I was reading my morning news, I came across something that was rather startling.
It turns out that in the last couple years, major companies have been stockpiling Bitcoins in anticipation of ransomware attacks.
Say what?
Apparently this is a trend that has only been accelerating as of late.
If you have been living under a rock and are not familiar with the "WannaCry" malware attack, you can learn more about it here:
http://www.nbcnews.com/news/world/wannacry-malware-cyberattack-slows-threat-remains-experts-say-n759661
Basically, it was a large ransomware attack where hackers took hundreds of thousands of computer's data files hostage in exchange for payments of $300 to $600 in Bitcoin.
Not many people have paid the ransom to date as the scheme has only netted something like $80,000 USD and most of the transactions were done via individual transactions. Which means that large companies likely didn't pay the ransom.
On a side note I read the other day that most of the people who had paid the ransom had not received their data back, so there is that...
Nevertheless, there has been a growing trend of companies stockpiling the virtual coins in case of hacks.
There are certain institutions where data is often needed to be accessed immediately, such as hospitals and financial institutions. For them it makes MORE sense to comply with the demands of the cyber-criminals than it does to try and fight them.
Hackers know this and because of this, these institutions are often their targets. Sad that hospitals would be a target, but it is what it is at this point.
This seems like something that only a few companies might be doing right?
Wrong!
Check out these statistics from the UK:
Over a third of British companies have admitted to stock piling cryptocurrencies in the last year in case of hacks. With medium sized companies being the most likely to do the stockpiling.
But wait, this is just giving into a form of terrorism is it not?!
Governments haven't really developed a way to counter a lot of these hackings at this point so companies have decided that stockpiling virtual coins has become just a cost of doing business.
They are likely to be hacked at some point and the preferred method of payment seems to be Bitcoin by these bad actors. So, it is better to have some on hand just in case, is a common thought process shared by many companies.
Britain's former technology ambassador and chairman of the annual international e-Crime Congress expanded on this a bit by saying:
"Once it's into your system, there's not much they can do about it."
"It's all well and good to catch up to the actors and prosecute them, but that doesn't help you if you happen to be a financial institution or a business and data is mission critical."
As you can see, at this point it appears that a lot of these companies don't have many other options. Especially if their data is needed urgently.
The total number of ransomware attacks quadrupled in 2016 and it is projected to double from that number in 2017.
This is the world we are living in folks.
It is a shame that this is driving some of the demand for virtual currencies at the moment but it looks like this is just one more small step in the long process of eventually gaining mass and main-street adoption.
Stay ransomware free my friends!
Sources (including images):
https://themerkle.com/bitcoin-price-holds-firm-as-chinese-exchanges-no-longer-represent-market-demand/
http://www.nbcnews.com/storyline/hacking-of-america/companies-stockpiling-bitcoin-anticipation-ransomware-attacks-n761316
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