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Bitcoin's Fluctuations Are Too Much For Even Ransomware Cybercriminals (theguardian.com)

Posted by msmash on from the too-much-for-me dept.

Bitcoin's price swings are so huge that even ransomware developers are dialling back their reliance on the currency, according to researchers at cybersecurity firm Proofpoint. From a report: Over the last quarter of 2017, researchers saw a fall of 73% in payment demands denominated in bitcoin. When demanding money to unlock a victim's data, cybercriminals are now more likely to simply ask for a figure in US dollars, or a local currency, than specify a sum of bitcoin. Just like conventional salespeople, ransomware developers pay careful attention to the prices they charge. Some criminals offer discounts depending on the region the victim is in, offering cheaper unlocking to residents of developing nations, while others use an escalating price to encourage users to pay quickly and without overthinking things. But a rapidly oscillating bitcoin price plays havoc with those goals, Proofpoint says.

3 of 84 comments (clear)

  1. No, bitcoin is not very different now by perpenso · · Score: 4, Insightful

    OK, bitcoin is seriously running out of use cases. Despite its reported "value," it's becoming more worthless by the day.

    "running out"? Its mostly been either a speculative instrument or a money transfer service. The former wants the volatility, the later doesn't really care so much since bitcoins are not held for any appreciable amount of time (immediately bought by person A, transferred, immediately sold by person B). The later is affected by the current high fees.

    Buying pizza and other normal products and services is largely a stunt. Why would true believers use the bitcoins for ordinary purchases when they expect bitcoin prices denominated in dollars/euros/etc to jump up significantly? For the gray and dark markets, they're switching to other coins with better anonymity. Its sort of surprising ransomware had not done so, or maybe they still use bitcoin for "customer" convenience and convert to the more anonymous coins on their side?

    So no, bitcoin is not very different now than in the past. These huge price drops are "normal". If I remember an Ars Technica article correctly the exponential price increases are typically (4 occurrences ?)) followed by a 75% drop in price. Ex the previous spike to around $1,000 a few years ago followed by a drop to around $250. If the pattern holds we might see something around $5,000 yet.

    1. Re:No, bitcoin is not very different now by Smidge204 · · Score: 3, Insightful

      the later doesn't really care so much since bitcoins are not held for any appreciable amount of time (immediately bought by person A, transferred, immediately sold by person B)

      Buying bitcoin, transferring it and selling it again is three transactions; That will take roughly four hours. As evidenced a few days ago, Bitcoin could easily gain or lose 10% or more of its value in those four hours. No sane or intelligent person would attempt it, unless they were desperate to hide the movement of money.

      And even the criminals are starting to doubt it's worth it.
      =Smidge=

  2. typical /. reaction by scatbomb · · Score: 1, Insightful

    bitcoin goes up

    slashdot: bitcoin is a bubble this proves it!

    bitcoin goes down

    slashdot: the bubble popped, this proves it!

    bitcoin goes up after going down

    slashdot: bitcoin is too volatile, must be worthless!