Agree to Disagree: Cyber War and Hacker Ransoms

Open to Debate

Education, News, Society & Culture

4.6 • 2.2K Ratings

🗓️ 15 October 2021

⏱️ 51 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

With cyber threats and ransomware on the rise globally, the Biden administration has enlisted America’s tech titans to help blunt their effects. Amazon, Microsoft, and Google, are all in discussions with Washington over how to strengthen the nation’s critical infrastructure defenses against a growing array of both private and state-sponsored attacks. Skeptics question just how much can be achieved, given how connected U.S. society has become. But solutions are emerging, from lifting the veil of cryptocurrencies, a favored transaction among hackers, to making the paying of ransoms illegal. In this special edition of Intelligence Squared’s Agree-to-Disagree series, John Donvan sits down with David Sanger of The New York Times for a closer examination of these attacks before launching into a much more specific debate with two cyber security experts. The debate: Should paying hacker ransoms be made illegal? Cyber Threat Alliance president and chief executive Michael Daniel and Rapid7 vice-president Jen Ellis square off in light of recent high-profile hackings. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Transcript

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0:00.0	Hi everybody and welcome to a special edition of Agree to Disagree.
0:07.4	I'm John Don Van and what makes this edition special is that in addition to our usual one-on-one
0:13.9	debate, this program is preceded by an expert interview meant to get us all up to speed
0:19.3	on the issue at hand and today that issue is cyberattacks.
0:24.0	When criminals hold computer systems hostage and demand payment to allow them to get back
0:28.8	online, does it make sense to pay up or does paying up only incentivize more attacks?
0:35.7	That's the debate and it's about to be had by two true cybercrime fighters in their
0:39.9	field, cyber threat alliance chief executive Michael Daniel and rapid seven vice president
0:45.4	Jan Ellis.
0:46.4	But first, a conversation with David Sanger of the New York Times.
0:50.8	He's going to help me set the table for what promises to be an important and especially
0:54.2	spirited debate.
0:56.2	So let's get to it.
0:58.0	David Sanger, you are perhaps the perfect person to help me give us the big picture on where
1:03.5	we are in the world we call the cyber war today.
1:07.6	Your New York Times long time White House national security and national security correspondent.
1:13.4	But you've also focused in with your book the perfect weapon war sabotage and fear in
1:19.4	the cyber age, which is also the inspiration for an HBO documentary that you executive
1:25.3	produced and that you appear in and that I understand is now up for an Emmy award.
1:29.6	So congratulations for that.
1:31.0	Well, thank you, John, and great to be back with you.
1:33.4	So I want to ask you my rip fan winkle question on this one.
	...

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