Home Malware Programs Ransomware Vipasana Ransomware

Vipasana Ransomware

Posted: June 27, 2016

Threat Metric

Threat Level: 8/10
Infected PCs: 274
First Seen: June 27, 2016
Last Seen: June 21, 2022
OS(es) Affected: Windows

The Vipasana Ransomware is a Trojan that uses a file-encoding algorithm to hold the contents of your PC for ransom, with previous payments approximating values of three hundred USD. There are no known, public decryption tools for the Vipasana Ransomware, which places the emphasis on protecting your information from this threat squarely on preventative measures. As with all threats, malware analysts advise using dedicated tools for eliminating the Vipasana Ransomware from your PC.

A Little Insight into an 'Insightful' Trojan

The Vipasana Ransomware, whose name is a near-translation of the phrase 'insight meditation,' is a predominantly Russian-region Trojan that may derive its code from much earlier threats hearkening back to as far back as 2014. Nearly a dozen revisions of that original sample have made themselves known since that time, with the Vipasana Ransomware being one of the newest suspects, dating from February. The Vipasana Ransomware uses non-consensual file encryption to target different types of data not essential to your OS's basic operations and then delivers a ransom note for contacting its administrators via e-mail.

As with most threats of its kind, the Vipasana Ransomware targets your data based on the underlying formats, such as images, movies or text documents. The Vipasana Ransomware also attacks some comparatively obscure formats, including proprietary ones like REDCODE RAW and Java Security certificates. Each file encrypted by the Vipasana Ransomware also suffers from an appending to its name that includes an e-mail address, the Vipasana Ransomware's version number, the date and time of the encryption, a string of random characters, and, finally, the '.cbf' extension.

The Vipasana Ransomware's ransom notes contain a minimum of information for potentially retrieving your content after paying its admins. The Vipasana Ransomware withholds its payment sum until further e-mail communications transpire, possibly as a way of giving the con artists additional bargaining room. Malware experts have yet to see any immediate weaknesses in the Vipasana Ransomware's encryption methodology that would let victims undo its attacks themselves, and, at this time, no freeware decryptors are available.

Meditating on Ideal Solutions for Digital Ransoms

The Vipasana Ransomware is a particularly clear display of how threats don't need to innovate in its basic attacks to be troublesome to insufficiently protected personal computers. While the Vipasana Ransomware expresses few differences from any other data-encrypting Trojan, the Vipasana Ransomware still can block your data and make it potentially completely irretrievable. The Vipasana Ransomware's con artists highlight this point in their ransom messages, which put the PC's operator under a week-long time limit for responding.

Along with the above symptoms, the Vipasana Ransomware infections also have correlations with other attacks directly targeting a PC's security, such as disabling the default Windows Firewall. Malware analysts often associate such attacks with a remote attacker's efforts to take remote control of a system, which lets them commit to other, corrupted actions, such as collecting data. Even the total encryption of all non-essential files may not be the full consequences of a Vipasana Ransomware infection.

The Vipasana Ransomware campaign is concentrating on attacking Russia and nearby nations, with its marketing to other threat actors similarly geographically-limited. PC owners with any reason to worry about this threat's campaign should use backups to save their content from the Vipasana Ransomware's encryption attacks, and anti-malware programs for uninstalling the Vipasana Ransomware.

As a rule, the most insightful response to any Trojan is to prevent it from being in a position to cause real harm in the first place.

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