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Spam program holds PCs hostage
London - Cybercrime investigators are looking into a barrage of scam sent to millions of British banking customers designed to freeze their computers and demand a ransom, Britain's National Crime Agency said.
The agency, which began operating only last month, said last Friday that its National Cyber Unit had become "aware of a mass e-mail spamming event which is ongoing, where people are receiving e-mails that appear to be from banks and other financial institutions".
The agency said it considered the attack a "significant risk". It added that while the spam e-mail may be sent out to "tens of millions" of British customers, they appear to be targeted mainly at small and medium-sized businesses.
The spam carries an attachment that appears to be correspondence related to the text of the e-mail - such as a voicemail or fax or details of a purported suspicious transaction or invoice seeking payment, the agency said.
In reality, it said, the attachment injects a malicious program - malware - into the computer, which opens it as well as the local network to which the machine is connected. Once triggered, a program called "Cryptolocker" that the crime agency described as "ransomware" proceeds to encrypt the files on the user's machine and the local network.
Once encrypted, the computer displays a message demanding a payment of two Bitcoins (an electronic currency, currently worth around £536) in return for the key to unlock the encryption.
The crime agency advised users not to pay the ransom and warned that even if it were paid, there was no guarantee the encryption key would be turned over.
Reuters
London - Cybercrime investigators are looking into a barrage of scam sent to millions of British banking customers designed to freeze their computers and demand a ransom, Britain's National Crime Agency said.
The agency, which began operating only last month, said last Friday that its National Cyber Unit had become "aware of a mass e-mail spamming event which is ongoing, where people are receiving e-mails that appear to be from banks and other financial institutions".
The agency said it considered the attack a "significant risk". It added that while the spam e-mail may be sent out to "tens of millions" of British customers, they appear to be targeted mainly at small and medium-sized businesses.
The spam carries an attachment that appears to be correspondence related to the text of the e-mail - such as a voicemail or fax or details of a purported suspicious transaction or invoice seeking payment, the agency said.
In reality, it said, the attachment injects a malicious program - malware - into the computer, which opens it as well as the local network to which the machine is connected. Once triggered, a program called "Cryptolocker" that the crime agency described as "ransomware" proceeds to encrypt the files on the user's machine and the local network.
Once encrypted, the computer displays a message demanding a payment of two Bitcoins (an electronic currency, currently worth around £536) in return for the key to unlock the encryption.
The crime agency advised users not to pay the ransom and warned that even if it were paid, there was no guarantee the encryption key would be turned over.
Reuters
