Do you know what Locked-in Ransomware is?
Locked-in Ransomware can shock you with its ransom note appearing on your screen after this major threat manages to sneak onto your system. Our researchers say that this malicious attack could cost you your personal files, such as photos, documents, and databases; however, we have found a free program on the net that may work for you to recover your files. This is definitely bad news for the creators of this malicious program since it disables their mission to fool people to extort money from them. And, we are talking about around 800 dollars worth of Bitcoins that is demanded from you for a decryption tool and key. Most users may not even keep that important files on their computer to pay this much, or at least, it is worth considering before rushing to transfer the ransom fee. Fortunately, in this case you may save the day and get away with this ransomware attack without losing your files. But before you download and use the free tool to restore your files, you should remove Locked-in Ransomware ASAP.
It seems that this ransomware infection follows suit and is mainly distributed as a malicious file attachment in spam e-mails. You may consider yourself a security-minded computer user and you would never purposefully open such a mail, let alone download its attachment. But, if you find this vicious program on board, there is a good chance that you did fall for the trick of a spam mail. This is why it is so vital that we tell you how this mail can trick you. First, the sender may look like an entirely legitimate worker of a well-known company (hotel, parcel delivery service, airline, etc.) and the related e-mail address also may appear to be totally authentic. This is the first line of doubt this mail will most likely pass because you could not decide by looking at it that this is a spam.
Locked-in Ransomware screenshot
Scroll down for full removal instructions
Then, the subject may refer to something that could be very important to you even if you felt that this could be a mistake and cannot relate to you. For example, you may see subjects like “Re: Invoice No. #12122016GD,” “Re: Your credit card details,” “Re: Overdue parking fine,” and so on. It is quite likely that you would want to see this mail and its attachment just to check if it is really for you. However, once you download the attached file and click to view it, you practically initiate this malicious attack. This is why when you finally manage to delete Locked-in Ransomware it will be too late to save your files from the encryption. And, this is why you need to be more careful which mails you open and which attachments you let on board. This is a typical case when a reliable anti-malware program could serve you right.
Our tests run in our internal lab revealed that this ransomware infection attacks your photos, documents, certain program files as well as your archives, and encrypts them using the AES-256 encryption algorithm. This algorithm is built in your Windows Operating system; therefore, it can work very fast. Practically, there is no chance that you could realize that you cannot use your files or that their extensions have changed before the whole process is over. This could take as little as 20 seconds depending, of course, on the specifics of your PC and the number of files targeted. All the ciphered files get a possibly random extension like “mydocument.docx.dK6kNIbYnmZD” although we have also found a sample that added a “.novalid” extension.
An .html file is created on your desktop that contains the ransom note. This file could be called "RESTORE_CORUPTED_FILES.HTML" or "RESTORE_NOVALID_FILES.HTML." This is the file that pops up on your screen once the encryption is over. This file informs you that your files have been encrypted and that you are not supposed to try to recover them yourself. You have to pay 1 Bitcoin (around $790) to the provided wallet address within 15 days, which is most likely the longest deadline we have ever seen. It is never safe to pay any amount of money to cyber crooks because they may not keep their word. Apart from their unwillingness to send you the decryptor or the key, it is also possible that your infection loses connection with the remote Command and Control server that stores your unique key and the tool. This would mean that you will never get the key even if you are ready to pay or you have transferred the fee already. But, luckily, in this case you do not need to worry about all this. If you are not a real techie, we would suggest that you find a friend who is, and ask him to help you identify and download the free tool that can help you recover your files. But do not start this process before you delete Locked-in Ransomware from your system.
If you have a recent backup copy of your files on a portable drive, you should not start transferring the clean files back to your hard disk before you make sure that you have removed Locked-in Ransomware and no leftovers remain on your system. You may feel ready to act manually; therefore, we have included a guide for you below this article. It is really not that difficult to eliminate this ugly threat. However, as you can see now, it could be a difficult task to protect your computer from such malicious attacks. If you want to feel safe while you are browsing the web or simply using your computer, we suggest that you employ a proper anti-malware program, such as SpyHunter or any other security tool of your choice.
How to remove Locked-in Ransomware from Windows
- Tap Win+E.
- Delete the malicious file you saved from the spam e-mail.
- Empty the Recycle Bin.
- Tap Win+Q and type regedit. Press the Enter key.
- Delete "HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows NT\CurrentVersion\Winlogon\LegalNoticeText" registry key.
- Close the editor and reboot your system.
In non-techie terms:
Locked-in Ransomware is a vicious threat that wants to push you to pay almost 800 dollars after it slithers onto your system and encrypts your most important files. The whole encryption process may only take one single minute or less. This does not give you enough time to react. Unfortunately, transferring money the cyber criminals who attack you with a ransomware program is always risky because you may not get the promised decryption code or software. The silver lining in this attack is that there seems to be a free file recovery tool that you can download and use to restore your encrypted files after you remove Locked-in Ransomware from your system. If you do not want to eliminate this dangerous threat manually, we suggest that you use a reputable anti-malware program to protect your system from all known malware infections.