Will The UK Legislate To Curb Ransomware Payments?

The UK Government considers ransomware attacks to be the greatest of all serious and organised cybercrime threats. In response, it has launched aconsultationon three measures to reduce payments to cybercriminals and increase ransomware incident reporting. The consultation runs until8 April 2025. The Government's aims are to undermine the ransomware business model – making UK businesses less profitable for cybercriminals to target - and improve the Government's intelligence around ransomware threats to inform future interventions. This briefing looks at the proposals and their potential implications.

1 Proposal 1: Targeted ban on ransomware payments

The Government proposes to extend the ban on ransomware payments so that it applies to all public sector bodies, including local government, and owners/operators of critical national infrastructure (CNI) that are regulated or that have competent authorities. The ban in respect of CNI coversthirteen sectors.