An economic analysis of ransomware and its welfare consequences

Hernández-Castro, Julio; Cartwright, Anna; Cartwright, Edward

doi:10.1098/rsos.190023

Cited by 27 publications

(25 citation statements)

References 19 publications

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“…Samples designed for monetary purposes utilize a variety of payment methods, mainly through cryptocurrencies such as Bitcoin, to collect ransom from the victims. This step is so important that several studies have been done on it ( Hernandez-Castro et al, 2017 , 2020 ; Laszka et al, 2017 ; Paquet-Clouston et al, 2019 ; Sokolov, 2021 ). Therefore, allocating a separate class for this purpose can lead to the production of knowledge of financial transactions related to extortionate attacks.…”

Section: Design Of Digital Extortion Ontologymentioning

confidence: 99%

An ontology-driven framework for knowledge representation of digital extortion attacks

Keshavarzi

Ghaffary²

2023

Computers in Human Behavior

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Section: Design Of Digital Extortion Ontologymentioning

confidence: 99%

An ontology-driven framework for knowledge representation of digital extortion attacks

Keshavarzi

Ghaffary²

2023

Computers in Human Behavior

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“…Malware can be divided into different categories, including worms, trojans, rootkits, viruses, spyware, keyloggers, botnets and ransomware [ 329 ]. In particular, ransomware attacks have become popular in recent years with the aim of hijacking a system whose files are encrypted with an attacker’s key, and ask for some payment in cryptocurrencies to restore them [ 349 ].…”

Section: Information Security: Requirements Attacks and Solutionsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Sensors for Context-Aware Smart Healthcare: A Security Perspective

Batista

Moncusi

López-Aguilar³

et al. 2021

Sensors

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The advances in the miniaturisation of electronic devices and the deployment of cheaper and faster data networks have propelled environments augmented with contextual and real-time information, such as smart homes and smart cities. These context-aware environments have opened the door to numerous opportunities for providing added-value, accurate and personalised services to citizens. In particular, smart healthcare, regarded as the natural evolution of electronic health and mobile health, contributes to enhance medical services and people’s welfare, while shortening waiting times and decreasing healthcare expenditure. However, the large number, variety and complexity of devices and systems involved in smart health systems involve a number of challenging considerations to be considered, particularly from security and privacy perspectives. To this aim, this article provides a thorough technical review on the deployment of secure smart health services, ranging from the very collection of sensors data (either related to the medical conditions of individuals or to their immediate context), the transmission of these data through wireless communication networks, to the final storage and analysis of such information in the appropriate health information systems. As a result, we provide practitioners with a comprehensive overview of the existing vulnerabilities and solutions in the technical side of smart healthcare.

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“…Among the key works in this substream, August et al [1] consider the perspective of a software vendor, in particular how the underlying economic externalities affect the vendor's pricing strategy. In contrast, Hernandez-Castro et al [6] examine the perspective of the ransomware attackers and how price-discrimination strategies employed by the attackers would impact social welfare. Laszka et al [7] investigate the decision of the potential victims to invest in backup technologies and to what extent such technologies can serve as a deterrent.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Should We Outlaw Ransomware Payments?

Dey

Lahiri

2021

Proceedings of the Annual Hawaii International Conference on System Sciences

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In recent times, there has been an upsurge in ransomware attacks, where an attacker encrypts a user's files and then demands a ransom in exchange for the decryption key. While paying the ransom allows the user to quickly unlock the locked files and avoid potentially larger losses, it also strengthens the hands of the attacker and increases the chance of a future attack. We study this dilemma of the victims and the externality posed by their actions using a game-theoretic model on top of a Markov decision process. The resulting equilibrium leads to several interesting insights such as that legally prohibiting ransom payments may not always have the desired economic effects-in some cases, a ban may be effective in addressing the economic externality but, in others, it could reduce public welfare. Our findings have important implications for policymakers who are currently debating legislation that, if enacted, will outlaw ransom payments to attackers.

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An economic analysis of ransomware and its welfare consequences

Cited by 27 publications

References 19 publications

An ontology-driven framework for knowledge representation of digital extortion attacks

An ontology-driven framework for knowledge representation of digital extortion attacks

Sensors for Context-Aware Smart Healthcare: A Security Perspective

Should We Outlaw Ransomware Payments?

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