Every oil pipeline, school, hospital, farm, old age home that's ransomed is 100% thanks to Bitcoin and its progeny. But hey, at least it's found a use case.
> One of the first ransomware attacks ever documented was the AIDS trojan (PC Cyborg Virus) that was released via floppy disk in 1989. Victims needed to send $189 to a P.O. box in Panama to restore access to their systems, even though it was a simple virus that utilized symmetric cryptography.
[1] https://www.crowdstrike.com/cybersecurity-101/ransomware/his...
As banking transactions can be reversed and are as opposite of anonymous as is practically possible, it would be (darkly) amusing if a traditional bank did that, precisely because the damage would be undone and the guilty parties trivially identified.
They're making a jab at a large usage of cryptocurrency: payment for ransomware exploits