TeslaCrypt Bitcoin ransomware has been claiming victims left, right, and center for several months now, but it looks as if this threat is finally over. The developers made the master decryption key publicly available, and anyone who is still dealing with this malware can restore file access free of charge.
TeslaCrypt Developers Bail And Leave Decryption Key
Considering how TeslaCrypt has been one of the most innovative – and disconcerting – types of Bitcoin ransomware to hit the Internet since February of 2015, it came as a big surprise to hear the developers have closed up shop. Moreover, they made the master decryption key publicly available to anyone and posted an apology message as well.
While it is positive to hear TeslaCrypt will not be making any more victims who are forced to pay a Bitcoin ransom, it appears the operators have set their sights on a new target. Security experts have found evidence they are turning towards CryptXXX ransomware as of late, which is another piece of malware infecting computers all over the world as of late.
Now that the master decryption key for TeslaCrypt has been leaked by the developers, everyone in the world can deal with this infection without paying a Bitcoin ransom. Moreover, the TeslaDecoder security application has been updated with this new information, and can now decrypt files encrypted by either version 3 or version 4 of the Bitcoin malware.
This reprieve will only be a short one, though, as replacing TeslaCrypt with CryptXXX is a far cry from good news for computer users. Although security experts of Kaspersky Labs have managed to outsmart its creators twice already, it may only be a matter of time until a new iteration of the ransomware makes its way to the Internet.
Whether or not we will see some of the TeslaCrypt features appear in future versions of CryptXXX remains unclear, but it is not unlikely. Despite this temporary victory over malware in general, the battle is far from over, and there are multiple Bitcoin ransomware strains still in circulation to this very day. Creating computer backups remain the top priority for everyone.
Source: Threatpost
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