Cyrat Ransomware

The Cyrat Ransomware is a file-locking Trojan that targets Windows systems currently. It can block media files with its encryption feature and hold them for ransom, along with attacks such as deleting backups and turning off default security features. Since its locking method is secure, users should have backups for recovering any media and let professional anti-malware products delete the Cyrat Ransomware.

Trusting the Wrong Software for a DLL Repair Job

File-locking Trojans can come in multitudes of disguises, and few of them will lock themselves too closely to specific themes. As for the Cyrat Ransomware, a new, file-locker Trojan that's outside of the usual families, it builds an unusual subject for its tactic into its payload directly. Besides this strategy and a few other discrepancies, its attacks depend on the archetypal 'encrypt and ransom' plan of attack of similar Trojans.

The Cyrat Ransomware is Python-based. Although malware experts only confirm buggy and crashing versions of it for Windows, some code suggests plans for other operating systems. After it runs, the Trojan displays a CMD window with ASCII art of 'DLL FIX v2.5' and additional text that implies repairing DLL files. The disguise could cause victims to avoid interrupting the Trojan during a highly-inefficient encryption routine, using Fernet, to block media files.

Fernet is very out-of-line for a Trojan of this kind and is inappropriate and unstable for files of larger sizes such as a gigabyte. It's possible that the developer, who asks for one thousand dollars in Bitcoin ransoms, relies on the format list for avoiding blocking the 'wrong' file types. Sadly, as usual, malware experts confirm the security of an additional RSA key makes third-party decryption practically impossible.

The Danger of Depending on Trojan Glitches for Safety

The samples of the Cyrat Ransomware available initially include a font dependency that causes a crash before the locking triggers. Assuming that the threat actor fixes this problem, the Trojan also has other attacks besides its encryption. It can change the wallpaper, create text ransom notes in every folder with blocked files, delete the Restore Points, and deactivate multiple Windows tools (the Registry Editor, the Task Manager and the Command Prompt).

The Trojan is, probably, still in development, with releases of samples to threat databases for testing the strength of its obfuscation. As is usually the case, users will require backups on other devices for a surety of recovering any files that the Trojan is locking, such as DOCs, MP3s, JPGs, TXTs or ZIPs. Users should avoid restarting their computers; the Cyrat Ransomware has no fail-safe against re-launching its encryption feature and blocking more content, including, ironically, its ransom notes.

Windows users can update their security solutions for bettering their chances of deleting the Cyrat Ransomware and similarly-new threats. Meanwhile, malware experts also discourage installing random 'file-repairing' software from untrustworthy sources.

The Cyrat Ransomware has a great deal of thought put into it even if it's an imperfect work. What harm it's capable of wreaking hinges just as much on users' avoidance of backup sensibilities as it does on the author's dutifulness towards programming.