What Causes Victims to Pay in a Ransomware Attack? The Psychology

Imagine yourself or your organization caught up in a ransomware attack. You’d quickly realize how limited your options are. Attackers generally present two grim choices: they’ll either release your sensitive data to the public or refuse to unlock the encrypted data unless you meet their demands. In most ransomware incidents, it boils down to a tough decision: to pay or not to pay.

This creates a moral and practical dilemma that cybersecurity professionals often debate. Is paying cybercriminals ever justifiable? While many experts strongly oppose it for various reasons, the decision isn’t always as clear-cut as it might seem.

Several factors often influence a victim’s decision to pay a ransom when an organization is attacked by ransomware. Of particular importance here is the criticality of the encrypted data. If the locked information is essential for daily operations like healthcare records, financial data, or intellectual property — organizations may feel the need to recover it quickly if there are no reliable backups. Backup availability is also a factor. With no recent, accessible backups, victims have fewer recovery options, making the ransom demand attractive.

Operational downtime costs are another big issue. For healthcare or manufacturing, where downtime can shut down operations, the financial impact is per hour. So, paying a ransom might be the fastest way to minimize those losses and get systems running again. Some cases also involve legal and regulatory issues. Data protection violations involving the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) can carry heavy fines—organizations might weigh those potential penalties against the ransom cost.

Attackers often play psychological games such as giving away some data to decrypt for free. This builds trust and integrity, as victims are convinced that paying ransom will get them their files back. The fact that attackers will follow through may make victims feel safer about complying with their demands. Finally, organizations with cyber insurance that covers ransomware payments may pay more because the financial burden is reduced. But this has created controversy because it makes insured entities attractive targets for future attacks.

While the general consensus in cybersecurity is to never pay cybercriminals, there are scenarios where paying might be the lesser of two evils. One such example is when human lives are at stake.

Consider a scenario where a hospital’s IT system has been compromised, and attackers have encrypted sensitive medical files. Without access to these files, the hospital may be unable to administer the proper care to critically ill patients, putting lives at risk. In such a case, there may be no other choice but to pay the ransom to retrieve the data.

This leads to a difficult ethical dilemma: Is it acceptable to pay cybercriminals to save lives? Most people would agree that, in this scenario, the health and safety of patients must come first. However, this creates a dangerous precedent, showing attackers that targeting critical infrastructure like healthcare facilities can result in quick payouts.

When ransomware attackers try to make victims pay, they often use psychological and operational pressure on victims, as mentioned above. Perhaps the most effective form of double extortion is when attackers also steal data and threaten to release information if the ransom is not paid. This raises the stakes as organizations fear losing client information, proprietary data, or internal communications. Even if the victim recovers from the data encryption, the risk of a data breach may push them to pay.

Governments across the globe have begun to recognize ransomware complexity, and some are considering legislation banning ransom payments altogether. That has, in some countries, sparked systemic debates about whether such regulation is feasible and enforceable.

A ban on all ransomware payments may prevent cybercriminals from profiting, but it may also leave victims helpless in critical situations. Organizations with insufficient backups or resources may find themselves completely unable to recover from an attack if the option to pay the ransom is off the table. As such, any regulation must strike a delicate balance between deterring ransomware attacks and allowing exceptions for extreme cases.

It’s a massive problem that many organizations have not prepared for. Regular backups, segmented networks, employee training, and advanced threat detection tools can reduce the risk of becoming a victim of ransomware, yet some organizations are still without defenses or disaster recovery plans.

Many new initiatives such as No More Ransom seek to help ransomware victims. These efforts raise awareness, provide free decryption tools, and encourage law enforcement and private sector collaboration to reduce ransomware attacks. Such initiatives are valuable but do not remove the threat entirely.

When it comes to ransomware attacks, prevention is better than facing the dilemma of whether or not to pay a ransom. BlackFog’s anti data exfiltration (ADX) technology stops attacks in real-time, preventing sensitive data from being exfiltrated in the first place, effectively stopping cybercriminals on their tracks.

Learn more about how BlackFog’s ADX technology can protect your organization from ransomware and data breaches. https://www.blackfog.com/contact/