I read this article A US official explains why the White House decided not to ban ransomware payments from Cyberscoop which sparked some discussion on the new Security Box email list. Unfortunately, I think this may be the only way to go, as it does fuel the enterprises to continue.
I do see the point however that it can drive them more underground, but maybe they’d just do everything in cash with mules and the like. They call them money mules.
We know that criminal activity is already done in many different ways, but crypto currency only fuels it because the money is untraceable. If we go back to the tracing of it, maybe we can pick up these guys. Problem is that they’re overseas, and they can’t easily do this ransomware thing if they don’t have crypto because other methods can be traced and investigated. That, I think we need.