Windows Help & Advice - USA (2019-11)

WINDOWS HELP HARDWARE FIXES SOFTWARE SOLUTIONS INTERNET TIPS

Security

ISTHISRANSOMWARE?

Q

A fewdaysago,I spotteda

coupleofstrange-looking

foldersonmydatadrive:

Tprogram136andOapplication5.

Aninternetsearchrevealed

nothing,soI trieddeletingone

ofthefilesonlyforCybereason

RansomFreetopopupandclaim

it hadblockedanattempttolock

mycomputer.I selectedthe

optiontoremovetheransomware,

butthenanotherfilepoppedup

initsplace:Tfiles37.Insidethese

areseeminglyrandomfileswith

variousformats.Wherearethey

comingfrom?

JohnBuchanan

NickP’ssolution

Aftersomeextensive

researchandfurther

scansusingJohn’sother

tools– AvastFREE,EEKand

Malwarebytes– wesuddenlyhad

our eureka moment! The folders

inquestion– hiddenbydefault

• arecreatedbyCybereason
  RansomFreeasbait.It monitors
  thesefoldersand,if it notices
  attemptstodeleteormodifythe
  files,it leapsintoaction.
  Thisso-called‘heuristic’
  detectionmeanstheapplication
  workssolelybylookingforcertain
  typesofsuspiciousbehaviour
  associatedwithransomwarerather
  thanrelyingondefinitionupdates
  tospotpotentialinfections.It can
  beeffective,butis ratherblunt.
  Cybereasonhasdiscontinuedthe
  toolnow,butasJohnknowswhat
  it’sdoing,hecanleaveit inplace
  if hewishes.
  Alternatively,hecouldtrya
  freealternativesuchasAcronis
  RansomwareProtection(www.
  acronis.com/en-gb/personal/
  free-data-protection/),which
  worksina similarwaybutalso
  offers5GBoffreeonlinespace
  whereyoucanstoreparticularly
  sensitivefilesoutofany
  ransomwareinfection’sreach,even
  if breachesAcronis’sdefences.

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DROPPING BAIT

Cybereason

RansomFree

creates ‘bait’ files

to detect

ransomware. Images : Cyberreason, BootRacer, MSI

64 |^ |^ November 2019