Today we will talk about the latest ransomware virus, called Alma Locker. This virus was discovered a few days ago, and now we can say that it is one of the most dangerous in recent months. Most ransomware, created in recent months have been pretty poor quality, and breaking most of them took no more than a week. In contrast, Alma Locker has no serious errors in its structure, and its encryption is secure.
Alma Locker was discovered by a researcher from Proofpoint, Darien Huss. Proofpoint said that so far there is no free no way to decrypt the encrypted files, but work is being done on it. Currently, the only safe way to restore files is the load of backups. If you have not made a backup - your files are likely to be lost.
How Alma Locker penetrates the system and encrypts the files
Alma Locker, like other similar viruses is being distributed via e-mail. After infection, the virus generates a random extension that will be added to the file names, and computer ID, based on the serial number of the drive C and MAC address of the first network interface. The virus can encrypt almost all the most popular data extensions, this applies to audio and video files, text documents and images. The program files remain safe. Alma Locker uses AES-128 encryption algorithm, so if you are going to try to decrypt the files yourself - you will fail.
When the encryption process is finished, the virus displays a message to the user with the requirements of redemption, referring to the payment to the TOR network sites, and links to download the decryption software, after the payment of ransom. Redemption amount is 1 Bitcoin, but fraudsters have established payment term of 5 days. While it is not known what will happen at the end of this period. It is likely that the amount of foreclosures will increase, or files will be deleted (partially or completely).
One of the links in the message leads to the requirements of TOR on the site where your ID is displayed, and the name of the extension that your files received. Also, we'll see how many hours left before the completion of 5-day count. There must have been a tool which demonstrates the scammer's ability to restore files, but it doesn't work currently. In the design of the website the pirate flag "Jolly Roger" is used. Rather, it is an allusion to the fact that, if user won’t pay the ransom, hackers will make him to walk the plank, or he will be keelhauled and sent to feed the fish. We hope that this is only a joke, and hackers won’t do such terrible things to regular users.
Despite the fact that Alma Locker is not an extraordinary virus, it is created with high quality and, most likely, its hacking will take at least a few weeks. If you are not going to pay hackers for data recovery, and want to protect other files from encryption, you should remove the virus from your computer.
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