The No More Ransom Project
So this is what a ransom note looks like:<p><a href="https:&#x2F;&#x2F;d1b10bmlvqabco.cloudfront.net&#x2F;attach&#x2F;is23h8nx8ff3jw&#x2F;hktxrml0e933lw&#x2F;iuogsulv5ns4&#x2F;20161024123233.jpg" rel="nofollow">https:&#x2F;&#x2F;d1b10bmlvqabco.cloudfront.net&#x2F;attach&#x2F;is23h8nx8ff3jw&#x2F;...</a><p>Short, blunt, helpful, clear. Pretty much what you&#x27;d like every memo you&#x27;ve ever gotten to be. Me, I&#x27;m a huge fan of ransom notes and Nigerian scam emails. We can learn a lot from them.<p>I&#x27;m pretty sure that when you get one of these that you&#x27;re dealing with a script. You pay .65880 BTC into its wallet, period. There is no negotiation with a script. What I&#x27;ve also heard is that you can trust the script because these guys want a good reputation. If it gets out that you paid and you didn&#x27;t get unlocked then no one would pay.<p>If you don&#x27;t want to pay on the backend then you have to back up on the front end. You should do that already. You should be able to take a sledge hammer to your laptop, buy another and not miss a beat. If you could do that then you could just reformat and reinstall.<p>Prevention is worth it. Protection is worth it. Paying? Well if you did the first two you wouldn&#x27;t be asking that question. But .65880 Bitcoin equals about 463.97 USD. So you might want to get on the prevention+protection train.<p>Prevention will help you against viruses, keyloggers, etc that can cause a lot more economic harm.<p>Protection, backing up, will also help you in the case of theft or dropping your MPB out of its sleeve when you get out the car. Done both.