Tag Archives: viruses

cryptowall

Virus Removal / Poweliks Rootkit

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I recently had a run in with a computer that, despite appearing clean, would use an incredible amount of bandwidth when plugged into the network. Despite the heavy bandwidth usage, every virus scan came back clean. A few days of on and off messing with it, and I decided to run Malwarebytes Anti-Rootkit beta. Sure enough, there was a virus on the computer, and it was a sneaky one. The Poweliks virus hides all of its code in the registry and injects itself into other processes. Rootkits are specially designed viruses which trick the OS into hiding them. Rootkits can be in […]

computer repair and virus removal green bay

Cryptolocker Clones (Cryptowall) and Ransomware

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A recent (and terrible) new trend emerging in malware infections are the use of ransomware. While normal malware may simply lock your computer or infect it with unwanted ads or utilities, ransomware holds your files by encrypting them and hiding the key to unlock them until you pay a specified amount of money to the attacker. The fees vary, but may be upwards of $500 with no real guarantee of unlocking your files if you do manage to pay. The only reliable method of defense against this type of attack is to keep regular backups of your data. While these types of […]