Australia Sees Surge of Cryptomalware: Symantec

  • 30 September 2014
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By Brian Prince on September 29, 2014
 
The land down under is not under the radar of cryptomalware.
According to statistics from Symantec, Australia has experienced a surge of attacks since May. During that timeframe there has been an increase of more than 1,300 percent in the occurrence of malware families such as Cryptolocker, Cryptodefense and Cryptowall. Globally, it increased approximately 14-fold during the same period.

 
"Cryptomalware is a particularly insidious form of threat that encrypts data files on the compromised computer and then attempts to extort money from the victim in order to have the files restored," according to Symantec's Security Response team. "Since many of us use personal computers to create and store documents for study or work, as well as media files of precious memories, the loss of these files can be particularly painful. This is what makes this form of extortion so effective for the criminal perpetrators."
 
Recent examples of cryptomalware affecting Australian users tend to be from theTrojan.Cryptolocker.F family, explained Symantec.
 
SecurityWeek/ full article here/ http://www.securityweek.com/australia-sees-surge-cryptomalware-symantec

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