I wonder if they actually decrypt the files for that amount or if they demand more. I keep backups, but if I somehow got hit by this, I think I'd pay the $50 to avoid losing the few days of work. (I'd have a bit of an ethical quandary about it, but I'd still probably do it if I'm being quite honest.)
At $50, do they get enough scale for the endeavor to be worthwhile? This malware doesn’t appear to be particularly smart, but it must have taken some effort to wrote and seed trackers with fakes, and it will all be for nothing once Apple updates the XProtect definitions.
That's when they target corporations and governments. Such small amounts are nothing when those are concerned.
If people keep downloading and installing, the fact that it’s only $50 makes it easier to justify and pay.
Most people don’t keep backups. Every time I had someone close call me about a phone they lost access to and if there was anything they could do for their pictures, the only thing you could say is, do you have backups? Then direct them to someone who could mess with their hardware (if they still had it) and see what they could do.
If it was a screen, they’d pay to get it replace. If it was a sketchy soldering job, they’d risk it just to get their photos, same with transferring boards, etc. If it was just paying $50 bucks, I know a ton of people that would spend they money and probably like 80% of them would then keep using their phones without backing it up.
Everything gets a clean install and only non-binaries get restored from backup.
I can do that more easily if I don't loose ~2–3 days of work though (or whatever amount of time has passed since the last offline backup). Even if I need to manually go through the documents so that only non-binaries are restored, just having them would probably be helpful.
I don't know, I guess it depends a lot on the actual situation: what I was working on at the time, etc. But that $50 price tag seems alluring.
Say I get a popup right now that says I have to send n BTC to wallet x. And say I do. What then? How do they find me to deliver a key?
It all seems rather nonsensical. They may as well fill your files with noise for all the difference it makes.
Fun fact–according to a local security firm I stopped by, Ransomware developers actually have to have good customer service because once it becomes known that files don't get decrypted, no one will pay for Ransomware. I've even seen screenshots (posted on the internet, so take it with a grain of salt) where Ransomware teams unlocked computers for free because the subject couldn't afford to pay the ransom.
This is essentially what policy and politics are... should be
So you can generate a unique private key for each person, give them the pubkey (the address), and watch the network for 1:1 reconciliation.
So you can generate N private keys, give the pubkeys (the address) to N people, and watch the network for 1:1 reconciliation.