Nasty Ransomware Holds PC Games Hostage

[Christopher1]

LOL! This virus is more hilarious than serious. 😀

Oh no, my games are gone what shall I do! (sarcasm)

Lose game data that you have spent 1000 hours or more on and then see if you are still laughing.

 

[alidan]

LOL! This virus is more hilarious than serious. 😀

Oh no, my games are gone what shall I do! (sarcasm)

Lose game data that you have spent 1000 hours or more on and then see if you are still laughing.

1000 in total maybe, but there are no games where you are using one character for 1000 hours outside of an mmo and you aren't saving the character data anyway.
also, i honestly doubt that its inside of the games save data, back the data up, format, reinstall and retry and if savedata is infected... well that sucks.

 

[soccerplayer88]

It's exactly the same as any other copypasta Crypto-ware virus.

On the game side of things this is pretty trivial. Most platforms (at least the major ones Steam, Origin, Uplay, etc.) have cloud saves. Worst case scenario you have to wipe your PC clean and reinstall.

The rest of your files on the other hand are toast unless a) you have a backup in place or get incredibly lucky with Shadow Volumes or b) the hackers get sloppy and drop the keys in the publics lap like the CryptoLocker takedown.

 

[Paul Wagenseil]

Robust antivirus software (the kind you pay for) should also be able to detect the Angler exploit kit's presence on websites.

Citation needed!

Not all free AV software products scan for malicious URLs, and of those that do, not all can adequately defend against code-changing malware or zero-day malware: http://www.tomsguide.com/us/best-antivirus,review-2588-5.html

you just listed a site that shows FREE antivirus as the BEST BUY. Pretty sure bought versions will have the EXACT same issues as free ones.

The top of that page explains why free products are seldom as good as the paid ones. But we created that roundup of free products because we know many people never want to pay for anything.

 

[egmccann]

could someone explain this to me. How could this actually endanger my Multiplayer game saves and history? Last time I checked all new games save my records on there servers and not on my computer. Like WoW.. If they crypt it I just reninstall my PC and install fresh WoW and continue to play and same goes with any new Blizzard game, EA game, Activision game and so on...

It doesn't really say what is encrypted. It could be specific data, it could be logs/screenshots people would want, etc. which you can't really "reinstall" if it gets corrupted or encrypted.

Other than those? Pfft. Format, reinstall, restore from backup.

 

[Paul Wagenseil]

could someone explain this to me. How could this actually endanger my Multiplayer game saves and history? Last time I checked all new games save my records on there servers and not on my computer. Like WoW.. If they crypt it I just reninstall my PC and install fresh WoW and continue to play and same goes with any new Blizzard game, EA game, Activision game and so on...

It doesn't really say what is encrypted. It could be specific data, it could be logs/screenshots people would want, etc. which you can't really "reinstall" if it gets corrupted or encrypted.

Other than those? Pfft. Format, reinstall, restore from backup.

Sure, if you have outboard backup that hasn't already been corrupted by this form of malware. Here's the full list of the filetypes that it encrypts: .7z;.rar;.m4a;.wma;.avi;.wmv;.csv;.d3dbsp;.sc2save;.sie;.sum;.ibank;.t13;.t12;.qdf;.gdb;.tax;.pkpass;.bc6;.bc7;.bkp;.qic;.bkf;.sidn;.sidd;.mddata;.itl;.itdb;.icxs;.hvpl;.hplg;.hkdb;.mdbackup;.syncdb;.gho;.cas;.svg;.map;.wmo;.itm;.sb;.fos;.mcgame;.vdf;.ztmp;.sis;.sid;.ncf;.menu;.layout;.dmp;.blob;.esm;.001;.vtf;.dazip;.fpk;.mlx;.kf;.iwd;.vpk;.tor;.psk;.rim;.w3x;.fsh;.ntl;.arch00;.lvl;.snx;.cfr;.ff;.vpp_pc;.lrf;.m2;.mcmeta;.vfs0;.mpqge;.kdb;.db0;.DayZProfile;.rofl;.hkx;.bar;.upk;.das;.iwi;.litemod;.asset;.forge;.ltx;.bsa;.apk;.re4;.sav;.lbf;.slm;.bik;.epk;.rgss3a;.pak;.big;.unity3d;.wotreplay;.xxx;.desc;.py;.m3u;.flv;.js;.css;.rb;.png;.jpeg;.txt;.p7c;.p7b;.p12;.pfx;.pem;.crt;.cer;.der;.x3f;.srw;.pef;.ptx;.r3d;.rw2;.rwl;.raw;.raf;.orf;.nrw;.mrwref;.mef;.erf;.kdc;.dcr;.cr2;.crw;.bay;.sr2;.srf;.arw;.3fr;.dng;.jpe;.jpg;.cdr;.indd;.ai;.eps;.pdf;.pdd;.psd;.dbfv;.mdf;.wb2;.rtf;.wpd;.dxg;.xf;.dwg;.pst;.accdb;.mdb;.pptm;.pptx;.ppt;.xlk;.xlsb;.xlsm;.xlsx;.xls;.wps;.docm;.docx;.doc;.odb;.odc;.odm;.odp;.ods;.odt;