🥺 Can America figure out how to stop all the Ransomware?

Pipelines. Schools. The food supply. America has been getting wrecked because of Ransomware in 2021. Is there a good way to stop it? 

• America knows, more or less, why it’s been going on: Many of the major attacks have been traced to Russia-based hackers, but the options for retaliation aren’t so simple. For one thing, the attacks haven’t definitively been connected to the Kremlin, although the White House believes the Russian government has the power to stop them. Security experts say America risks escalation from Russia, i.e. even more attacks if it gets angry.  

• So what will the U.S. decide?: The NYT reports that the Biden Administration is on the verge of giving another verbal warning to Putin (he previously notified Putin of several critical infrastructure areas that would lead to an American attack if they were hacked) or potentially making stronger moves to dismantle Russian cyberinfrastructure. 

We may be at the “red line”

Basically, the cyber attacks have been so frequent and so strong, particularly a July 4 hacking by a Russian group known as REvil, that the U.S. will take a new approach to dealing with Russia through a counterstrike.

The Verdict

The year of Ransomware is not slowing down at all and if anything is headed for an entirely new chapter. In fact, REvil mysteriously shut down as of Tuesday night. Was it America or Russia who brought them down? We don’t know.