Crypto Locker Virus

[sadoldgit]

Picked this (Crypto Locker virus) up in June and it has locked my docs and photos. The guy who looks after my PC says I am stuffed if I dont pay the ransom. Running XP. Any advice? Thanks.

[saintmonkey1979]

Had that too. Nothing I tried worked to repair it. Whatever you do, don't pay the developer to repair/decrypt the files. After lits of research I discovered that it doesn't necessarily work and you end up hundreds of quids out of pocket. The only way I got round it was to reinstall xp. I lost most of my files, which was gutting, but by that time they were gone or not useable anyway. Sorry to be the bearer of bad news.

[sadoldgit]

Had that too. Nothing I tried worked to repair it. Whatever you do, don't pay the developer to repair/decrypt the files. After lits of research I discovered that it doesn't necessarily work and you end up hundreds of quids out of pocket. The only way I got round it was to reinstall xp. I lost most of my files, which was gutting, but by that time they were gone or not useable anyway. Sorry to be the bearer of bad news.

 

Hi SM and thanks. I am not a tekkie but the people I spoke to in the pub last night said I could just Google it and find a cure. Didnt expect it to be that easy to be honest. What if I upgrade to Windows 8 and transfer the files. Would that make it easier to fix do you know?

[saintmonkey1979]

I have no idea in all honesty SOG. I would imagine it depends on what kind of encryption the scum have used. It may be worth a try though I suppose. Especially now there is no Microsoft support for XP. There may be someone who is more computer savvy than myself though who may have a better solution.

[stthrobber]

http://www.symantec.com/security_response/writeup.jsp?docid=2013-091122-3112-99

 

You might find this link helpful Bern, but if you aren't a Norton user I don't know if it will let you download and use their removal tools, but it's worth a shot

[Tractor_Saint]

Sorry, you're stuffed, and don't pay the ransom as chances are you'll not just lose your data but you'll lose your money.

 

It's quite clever this virus and, unless you've got a backup of the files, they are assigned to the bit bucket in the sky. Sadly it'll also look for network shares so if you backup to another device on the network and don't offline it when you have the virus it'll encrypt that data as well. Nasty little beast.

[sadoldgit]

Sorry, you're stuffed, and don't pay the ransom as chances are you'll not just lose your data but you'll lose your money.

 

It's quite clever this virus and, unless you've got a backup of the files, they are assigned to the bit bucket in the sky. Sadly it'll also look for network shares so if you backup to another device on the network and don't offline it when you have the virus it'll encrypt that data as well. Nasty little beast.

 

Aw sh*t

[sadoldgit]

http://www.symantec.com/security_response/writeup.jsp?docid=2013-091122-3112-99

 

You might find this link helpful Bern, but if you aren't a Norton user I don't know if it will let you download and use their removal tools, but it's worth a shot

 

Thanks Throbber!

[badgerx16]

Plenty of removal tools out there, all major anti-malware systems can do this, just GOOGLE it. Unfortunately, as Tractor says, the data is lost. We've had this at work, bloody annoying but luckily everything is regularly backed up.

[badgerx16]

Just got a link to this in my email -

http://www.fireeye.com/blog/corporate/2014/08/your-locker-of-information-for-cryptolocker-decryption.html

https://www.decryptcryptolocker.com/

Edited 6 August, 2014 by badgerx16