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F-Secure's Mikko Hypponen tells SCMagazineUK.com how the company is now tracking ransomware Bitcoin wallets to reveal the huge amounts of money the gangs are making.
Could we ever put an end the blight of ransomware?
Are we about to witness a ransomware unicorn? According to Mikko Hypponen, chief research officer of Finnish F-Secure, we are. But there's a caveat.
A unicorn is a startup business which has received the valuation of a US$ 1 billion dollars (£757 million) or more. Think AirBnB, Uber, or Spotify.
In an interview with SCMagazineUK.com, Hypponen explained: "Bitcoin is based on Blockchain, and Blockchain is a public ledger of transactions. So all Bitcoin transactions are public. Now, you don't know who is who. But we can see money moving around, and we can see the amounts."
Bitcoin has not only changed the economics of cyber-crime by providing crooks with an encrypted, nearly anonymous payment system autonomous from any central bank. It's also changed researchers' ability to track how much money criminals are making.
Hypponen detailed how F-Secure is tracking over 100 wallets, the biggest of which contains over 12,000 Bitcoins (over £5 million). And interestingly, Hypponen says there appears to be a lot of gangs who aren't cashing out.
Learn more / En savoir plus / Mehr erfahren:
http://www.scoop.it/t/securite-pc-et-internet/?tag=Bitcoin
http://www.scoop.it/t/21st-century-learning-and-teaching/?tag=bitcoin
F-Secure's Mikko Hypponen tells SCMagazineUK.com how the company is now tracking ransomware Bitcoin wallets to reveal the huge amounts of money the gangs are making.
Could we ever put an end the blight of ransomware?
Are we about to witness a ransomware unicorn? According to Mikko Hypponen, chief research officer of Finnish F-Secure, we are. But there's a caveat.
A unicorn is a startup business which has received the valuation of a US$ 1 billion dollars (£757 million) or more. Think AirBnB, Uber, or Spotify.
In an interview with SCMagazineUK.com, Hypponen explained: "Bitcoin is based on Blockchain, and Blockchain is a public ledger of transactions. So all Bitcoin transactions are public. Now, you don't know who is who. But we can see money moving around, and we can see the amounts."
Bitcoin has not only changed the economics of cyber-crime by providing crooks with an encrypted, nearly anonymous payment system autonomous from any central bank. It's also changed researchers' ability to track how much money criminals are making.
Hypponen detailed how F-Secure is tracking over 100 wallets, the biggest of which contains over 12,000 Bitcoins (over £5 million). And interestingly, Hypponen says there appears to be a lot of gangs who aren't cashing out.
Learn more / En savoir plus / Mehr erfahren:
http://www.scoop.it/t/securite-pc-et-internet/?tag=Bitcoin
http://www.scoop.it/t/21st-century-learning-and-teaching/?tag=bitcoin