Just a few weeks after crypto crooks attacked the Colonial Pipeline with a ransomware demand, causing the extremely vital gas pipeline to shut down for a week, leading to spiking prices and lines at gas stations, the Justice Department has elevated such attacks to the same level as an act of terrorism.
The decision comes after an announcement Monday by the DoJ that it recovered about $4.4 million worth of Bitcoin Colonial CEO's payment to the hackers who prompted the pipeline's shutdown, CNN reports, adding, "The ransom recovery is a rare outcome for a company that has fallen victim to a debilitating cyberattack in the booming criminal business of ransomware."
The network added:
Colonial Pipeline Co. CEO Joseph Blount told The Wall Street Journal in an interview published last month that the company complied with the $4.4 million ransom demand because officials didn't know the extent of the intrusion by hackers and how long it would take to restore operations.
But behind the scenes, the company had taken early steps to notify the FBI and followed instructions that helped investigators track the payment to a cryptocurrency wallet used by the hackers, believed to be based in Russia. US officials have linked the Colonial attack to a criminal hacking group known as Darkside that is said to share its malware tools with other criminal hackers.
"I know that’s a highly controversial decision" to pay the ransom, Colonial Pipeline CEO Joseph Blount told The Wall Street Journal last month. "I didn’t make it lightly. I will admit that I wasn’t comfortable seeing money go out the door to people like this. But it was the right thing to do for the country."
No doubt these are the reasons why the Biden regime is moving so swiftly in elevating attacks like this to such a high level:
-- Ransomeware is a form of terrorism...digital terrorism.
-- The collective that attacked Colonial Pipeline was based in Russia, and nothing happens in that country without at least a wink and a nod from President Vladimir Putin.
-- The pipeline supplied 45 percent of gas, diesel, and jet fuel to the East Coast (where Washington, D.C. is located).
-- Politically and geopolitically speaking, if Biden doesn't do anything, he will appear even more weak than he is both at home and abroad.
Consider this comparison: When Antifa and Black Lives Matter anarchists were rioting throughout the country last year, including attacks on federal immigration properties and courthouses, Democrats yawned and even egged on the rioting as 'necessary for social change' following George Floyd's death. But the minute some patriots and conservative supporters of Donald Trump get a little rowdy at the U.S. Capitol where Democrats work, they want to round every single one of them up and throw them in solitary confinement at the pathetic and brutal D.C. Jail.
But in the case of cyber attacks, Biden's handlers get this one right: They are a form of terrorism and if they aren't treated as such, then they will continue, get worse, and destroy entire segments of our society and economy.
“To ensure we can make necessary connections across national and global cases and investigations… we must enhance and centralize our internal tracking of investigations and prosecutions of ransomware groups and the infrastructure and networks that allow the threats to persist,” Deputy Attorney General Lisa Monaco told U.S. attorneys around the country late last month, according to ARS Technica.
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