Should it be illegal to pay a hacker to stop hacking?

Every day there are more people in social networks advocating by declaring the payment to hackers illegal to recover the information that has been “kidnapped” for a ransom payoff.

And one of the most notorious actions was suffered by the company Colonial when hackers paralyzed their fuel supply activity and the company paid about 4.5 million dollars to be able to return to their normal activity and be able to continue attending their clients.

In similar situations there are many other companies (although it almost never becomes known by the public), and each reacts differently depending on the level of risk that the hacking action is suffering.

It is true that these actions suppose blackmail and a robbery, and that the most reasonable is to refuse to pay, but the companies analyze the relationship between what it costs them to pay and what it would cost them not to pay and solve the problem in other ways. And when they do economic calculations, they almost always decide to pay because it’s less expensive.

The problem of the world of hacking is that the most important hackers are somehow “protected” by certain governments that give them shelter and coverage. In general, they are more or less dictatorial and more or less corrupt governments that I suppose they charge a part of the hackers they have under their “protection”.

And we talk about a business of many tens of millions of dollars.

The solution is not easy, and those who scream the most requesting that no one pay and to prohibit it, is because they are not responsible for the economic results of a company.

I believe that governments have a lot to do and a lot to work together with other governments to fight against this scourge that does not look like is coming to an end, but rather the opposite.