It's nice and all, but the same people who are running the biggest ransomware operations now had no trouble receiving the billions of dollars they were stealing directly from US bank accounts before they pivoted to ransomware.

Ransomware would still work just fine using regular bank transfers. Especially given that the payor has no incentive to stop that money from arriving at it's destination.

But sure, using crypto the criminals get to keep the 20-30% they'd pay for payment processing otherwise. I'm not sure that really makes a difference though.

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sigmarule 2 days ago | parent [-]

Pre-crypto ransomware operations receiving billions through bank transfers is fantasy, or less euphemistically, a lie. Trying to hand wave away the absolutely-real logistical difficulties groups would be plagued by if they shifted to using global financial institutions instead of crypto is additionally dishonest.

	▲	monerozcash 2 days ago \| parent [-]
		It's neither fantasy, nor a lie. You shouldn't throw around accusations like that without actually familiarizing yourself with the topic. Banking trojans were doing just that, and receiving that money is obviously far more challenging than ransom payments because the owner will tend to notice pretty quickly and want it back. Ransomware doesn't have this problem, they can just deliver the keys only after they actually have the money in their control. BEC groups are stealing billions every year via bank transfers right now. .ru crime forums are absolutely full of people who will handle the logistics for you. They'll provide you bank accounts to send the money to, and deliver you whatever is left after their cut. A regular customer with high volumes will get excellent rates. The logistics aren't a challenge because there is absolutely massive pre-existing infrastructure already available. Ransomware isn't big because of crypto(currency), Winlockers were popularized well before crypto payments became common. Ransomware just happened to develop at the same time as crypto, not thanks to it.