Watch Out! Massive Ransomware Phishing Scheme Detected

phishing

We’re constantly warning you about new ransomware attacks. That’s because ransomware is one of the biggest digital threats in the world and we want to keep your data safe. The FBI said victims paid nearly $1 billion in ransom in 2016.

One of the largest ransomware variants ever is dubbed Locky. It seemed to be on hiatus for a while, but it’s making a come back in a huge, scary way.

Watch out for a new version of Locky ransomware

A new variant of Locky ransomware was discovered this week by researchers at AppRiver. It’s one of the largest malware campaigns this year. Over 23 million messages that contained Locky were sent in less than 24 hours on August 28, 2017.

The threat is being distributed through phishing emails with a subject line that reads either please printdocumentsphotoimagesscans, or pictures. Each of the messages includes a ZIP attachment that contains a Visual Basic Script (VBS) file.

If the attachment is clicked, the VBS file initiates a downloader and infects the victim’s gadget with Locky ransomware. A ransom message then takes over the screen and looks like this:

locky
Image: Example of Locky ransomware note. (Source: AppRiver)
[vc_btn title=”Continue reading” style=”outline” color=”primary” link=”url:https%3A%2F%2Fwww.komando.com%2Fhappening-now%2F417159%2Fwatch-out-massive-ransomware-phishing-scheme-detected%3Futm_medium%3Dnl%26utm_source%3Dalerts%26utm_content%3D2017-09-03-article-title|title:Continue%20reading|target:%20_blank|”][vc_message message_box_style=”outline” message_box_color=”blue”]Kim Komando, excerpt posted on SouthFloridaReporter.com, Sept. 4, 2017[/vc_message]