A new ransomware variant currently circulating locks your entire computer from the boot process. The new threat is called "Petya", and instead of looking for your most important archives to encrypt them, it encrypts your entire drive, according to the company G Data Software.
The malicious software, landing on its victims' computers, via an alleged email is from someone looking for a job. The email contains a "resume" attachment that is actually ransomware.
Malware is hosted on Dropbox. When the "resume" is downloaded to the computer, the ransomware deletes the boot records, forcing the victim's computer to shut down.
When you try to restart, a message appears saying that the computer is trying to fix an error and that the process may take several hours. During this time, malware encrypts the entire victim's disk.
Once the process is complete, the bitter truth is presented to the user: You must pay a ransom through Tor or lose access to what's on his hard disk. The ransom is doubled after seven days.
As with many of these attacks, Petya relies on the bad habits of many of its users Internet to click on any connection meet in front of them.
A sure way to reduce the risks of such contaminations is to not open files from people you don't know. Consider that even if you know them, they may have been a victim of malicious activity themselves attacks.
For more steps to protect your computer:
