Blm Ransomware

The Blm Ransomware is a file-locking Trojan that's part of the Dharma Ransomware's Ransomware-as-a-Service. Despite its name and referential e-mail address, it has no relationship with the Black Lives Matter political movement. Users can best protect any files from these attacks by saving backups to secure locations and having their anti-malware products up-to-date to flag and remove the Blm Ransomware.

Even Trojans are Susceptible to Political Mores

News, fads, and popular media themes, in the political sphere and outside of it, are cultural touchstones that Trojans and their threat actors can appropriate, just as much as anyone else. Many such thematic fits of abuse are part of independent and free projects, like the Hidden Tear spin-off of TrumpHead Ransomware. The Blm Ransomware is a little less than typical thanks to being part of the typically more buttoned-down Ransomware-as-a-Service industry.

The Blm Ransomware, specifically, is part of the Dharma Ransomware, a RaaS that includes hundreds of members, varying from the Bmd Ransomware and the Eur Ransomware to the older Prdns Ransomware, Save Ransomware and others. It's rare for Trojans of the Windows family to take names that are non-random, and even rarer for political themes to be part and parcel of their campaigns.

As concerns its technical characteristics, malware experts, as expected, find few updates of substance. The Blm Ransomware locks files with a secure, AES, and RSA encryption method, with a preference for media formats like documents, images, archives, and dozens of others. This locking attack holds the files hostage while the Trojan delivers its ransom notes: HTA pop-ups and TXT text files. Bitcoins for the payment guarantees that criminals can take the ransoms at their leisure, with no risk of refunds or other legal actions against them.

Why the Blm Ransomware Politics might be a False Flag

The Blm Ransomware is, naturally, not related to the Black Lives Matter movement, and paying its ransom is no different from rewarding any other Trojan from the Dharma Ransomware group. Its threat actor's preference for the Chinese Tencent QQ service for e-mail makes it possible that the attacker isn't even in the United States. Generally, malware experts suggest not paying, regardless of the criminal's identity, since there's no certainty of having a decryption service restore the files afterward.

Although the Blm Ransomware's installer samples show no clear flags for their distribution exploits, most users on Windows systems already should have appropriate precautions. Using strong passwords will stop attackers from gaining access through brute-force methods, disabling macros, Flash and JavaScript will stop many script-based exploits, and safe downloading behavior will dodge most Trojan installers inside bundles and misnamed files. Backups for recovery are essential since malware experts rarely see a Ransomware-as-a-Service Trojan without local backup-deleting features.

Anti-malware programs from trusted companies should flag, quarantine, and delete these threats securely.

The Blm Ransomware might reference the BLM movement as a joke, as a backhanded insult, or even part of its installation scheme. What's certain is that, like political participation, participating in protecting one's digital data is an urgently-necessary aspect of everyone's daily lifestyle.