Deputy AG Lisa Monaco speaking on CNBC
- need to treat ransomware attacks with urgency
- no country should be harboring malicious criminal actors
- Threat to critical infrastructure is real
- We should not allow us to victimize in the first place
- Are companies today making investments to be ready for a ransomware attack
- The preferred method is to be paid in cryptocurrencies.
- Companies need to disclose to US government if they paid ransoms to help aid investigations of cyberattacks
- The use of cryptocurrency can have many beneficial services, but need to be able to trace the money flow
It seems that each and every week, there is a ransomware attack on a US corporation, that has the potential to disrupt supply chains, and normal business activity. They are a productivity drain.
In the past, the ability to follow the money from a ransomware attack was a deterrent. Now with Bitcoin wallets, following the money is harder if not near impossible. As a result, the bad actors are having a field day.
Corporations can back up their data off the cloud and have other safety measures, but if the bad actors get confidential information and threaten to put that data out for all to see, the backups do not do any good.
