Our founder who art investing, HODL be thy name

from here and here (image source)

I think it was Ben McKenzie who said don't invest more than you can afford to lose.

The Bitcoin Kid

Watch on YouTube

Imagine pulling off one of the biggest bitcoin heists and seemingly getting away with it with little more than a slap on the wrist. I wonder who that kid was and if he wound up working in the security industry - or if he even needs to work at all anymore.

Backups get you back up and running

from here and here

Y'know, with a name like "ran somewhere" you'd think the process would be faster.

No Whammies!

found on Imgflip

This is quite an apt comparison. "Investing" in cryptocurrency is very much a gamble, and there are many ways for you to lose everything. Maybe it would be safer if people treated it like gambling instead of investing, and only put into it as much money as they can afford to lose. Of course there are still people with gambling problems who lose everything that way too, but at least people would have a better idea of what they were getting into and what kinds of risks are involved. 

Maybe backups would have been faster

from here and here

I've heard that one of the reasons victims pay is that it can be faster to pay the ransom and decrypt the data than to restore from backups, but if it can take hours for a bitcoin transaction to go through then maybe that argument isn't so clear-cut after all. 

Bitcoin can't unfry a hard drive

from here and here

While it's true that some ransomware operators have incorporated blackmail into their business model so that simply restoring from backups is no longer sufficient to resolve the incident, many if not most victims still seem to be unwilling or unable to recover from backups. It's as if they think ransomware is all they need to worry about and they can simply pay the ransom to get their data back, as if that's just the cost of doing business. 

That cryptocurrency won't uncrush a laptop, it won't unflood an office, it won't stop a fire, or any of the other sorts of disasters that really would benefit from backups. Backups are still the best way to get your data back.

It takes a special kind of scumbag...

from here and here

As bad as it is to hack the living, it somehow seems worse to hack the dead.

"I'm telling your mom" used to mean something

from here

When you're a parent you are your child's first experience with authority. You make the rules. You hand out the punishments. As your child gets older they may end up breaking not just your rules but society's rules and there's an expectation that you will exercise your authority in those cases as well, because the alternative is to be an accessory and then more formal authorities get involved. 

Such is the case of the parents of two UK kids who stole bitcoins from people while they were still minors.

As predictable as the seasons

from here

I've seen enough bitcoin 'give-aways' to know where this is going. These days most bitcoin give-aways are scams. Even if this one is legit, there are going to be so many fraudulent variations that people won't know which is the real one.

It may be that life imitates art, but business should know better than to imitate fraud. Free money usually falls under the heading of too good to be true, but this is going to lend an air of credibility to the concept and people are going to get burned as a result.

It's not a data breach, it's an unexpected backup

found on Laughing It

I'd be surprised if the hacker didn't just take the bitcoins for themselves rather than telling you the login details. If the hacker is just asking for a portion of the funds I'm tempted to say s/he deserves it for providing a valuable service.

The state says gimme gimme

from here

There's some strange logic going on in this bitcoin mining malware case in Germany. The state is laying claim to the bitcoins under the argument that the bitcoins weren't stolen. No of course not, electricity and computing resources were stolen and converted into bitcoins. If I steal a car and convert it into cash does the state keep the cash? Shouldn't the money go back to the victims to compensate them for what was taken?

The Fail Whale must have joined the security team

from here

You know you're doing security wrong when... a 17 year old from Florida takes control of virtually any account he wants to to do little more than launch a bitcoin scam.

Everybody poops

from here and here

With the value of bitcoin going down and the scarcity of toilet paper on the rise, it seems like this is a possible outcome.

So much for 'easy money'

from here and here

I have never heard of victims getting their bitcoins back, but apparently it may be a possibility in this one particular case and frankly my mind is blown. If this becomes widespread then using bitcoin for criminal purposes is going to get harder. And that's a good thing.

We wish you a Merry Cryptmas and a Happy New Sneer

found on Agent-X Comics

Happy holidays and I hope you all got something with more substance.

Tales from the Crypto Keeper

from here

Maybe we should rename Bitcoin to Satoshi's Monster.

Somebody somewhere is going to be phishing for those credentials

found on Imgur

I could maybe see a vending machine, but an ATM? I hope they realize this will likely spawn new types of crime.

Bitcoin's Public Ledger Is Public

from here

No matter how much you want it to be, bitcoin is not anonymous. All transactions are recorded in the block chain and can be viewed and traced by anyone.