Ransomware is a malware that encrypts information and documents and demands a rescue quantum for decoding them. Ransom payment is made by cryptocurrencies like Bitcoin, facilitating online and anonymous payment.

Ransomware has become a familiar front page news topic thanks to recent high-profile attacks against a major meat producer and an East Coast operator of a critical oil pipeline. Also, consider the attack on a provider of software tools to IT outsourcing shops that let hackers paralyze hundreds of businesses on all five continents. No doubt the ransomware threat is serious, and now Washington is mobilizing to wipe out a scourge it formerly treated only as a criminal nuisance.