In 2021, North Carolina became the first state to prohibit public ransomware payments, even going so far as to ban negotiations with cyber criminals. It was a groundbreaking move. Florida followed suit in 2022, but its legislation took a less stringent approach, covering a narrower range of entities and omitting some of the stricter provisions found in North Carolina’s law.
North Carolina and Florida’s bans are the only ones that exist at the state level, but they have ignited a nationwide conversation about the best way to combat this pervasive cyber threat. Years later, experts still haven’t come to a unified conclusion about whether it’s the right approach. The heart of the matter lies in a moral and fiscal dilemma: Should governments refuse to fund criminal enterprises, even when the alternative could mean crippling disruptions to essential services like hospitals, schools and public safety?
Read more…
Source: Government Technology
Related:
- Japanese telco giant NTT Com says hackers accessed details of almost 18,000 organizations
March 10, 2025
Japanese telecom giant NTT Communications (NTT Com) has confirmed that hackers accessed the data of almost 18,000 corporate customers during a February cyberattack, affecting an as-yet-unknown number of individuals. The Tokyo-based NTT Com, which provides phone and network tech to enterprises, said it discovered the data breach on February 5 after determining that the hackers had ...
- New botnet unleashes record-breaking DDoS attacks
March 7, 2025
A new botnet dubbed “Eleven11bot” has emerged, delivering what security researchers believe are the largest distributed denial-of-service (DDoS) attacks ever recorded. The botnet, primarily composed of compromised webcams and video recorders, has triggered widespread service disruptions and ignited a debate within the cybersecurity community about its true size. Nokia’s Deepfield Emergency Response Team first detected the ...
- Trojans disguised as AI: cybercriminals exploit DeepSeek’s popularity
March 6, 2025
Among the most significant events in the AI world in early 2025 was the release of DeepSeek-R1 – a powerful reasoning large language model (LLM) with open weights. It’s available both for local use and as a free service. Since DeepSeek was the first service to offer access to a reasoning LLM to a wide ...
- Russian crypto exchange Garantex seized by law enforcement operation
March 6, 2025
The U.S. Secret Service, working with a coalition of international law enforcement agencies, has taken down and seized the website of Garantex, a Russian cryptocurrency exchange accused of being associated with darknet markets and ransomware hackers. On Thursday, the official Garantex website was replaced with a notice saying the exchange’s domain has been seized by the ...
- Unpacking a B2B Business Email Compromise (BEC) Scenario
March 5, 2025
When an organization is subject to a Business Email Compromise (BEC), a single email could result in substantial monetary losses. Threat actors employing such tactics could employ different techniques, ranging from simple to advanced, and have seen increased activities yearly. A recent investigation examined not a typical BEC scenario where a threat actor simply sends a ...
- US charges Chinese hackers who allegedly caused millions of dollars worth of damages
March 5, 2025
US prosecutors on Wednesday announced criminal charges against multiple Chinese nationals for allegedly hacking a range of US companies and municipalities for profit, causing millions of dollars’ worth of damage. Victims of the hackers include US-based critics of the Chinese government, Asian government foreign ministries, and US federal and state agencies, the Justice Department said. Some ...