MoWare H.F.D Ransomware

Posted: May 25, 2017

Threat Metric

The Threat Meter is a malware assessment that SpywareRemove.com's research team is able to give every identifiable malware threat. Our Threat Meter includes several criteria based off of specific malware threats to value their severity, reach and volume. The Threat Meter is able to give you a numerical breakdown of each threat's initial Threat Level, Detection Count, Volume Count, Trend Path and Percentage Impact. The overall ranking of each threat in the Threat Meter is a basic breakdown of how all threats are ranked within our own extensive malware database. The scoring for each specific malware threat can be easily compared to other emerging threats to draw a contrast in its particular severity. The Threat Meter is a useful tool in the endeavor of seeking a solution to remove a threat or pursue additional analytical research for all types of computer users.

The following fields listed on the Threat Meter containing a specific value, are explained in detail below:

Threat Level: The threat level scale goes from 1 to 10 where 10 is the highest level of severity and 1 is the lowest level of severity. Each specific level is relative to the threat's consistent assessed behaviors collected from SpyHunter's risk assessment model.

Detection Count: The collective number of confirmed and suspected cases of a particular malware threat. The detection count is calculated from infected PCs retrieved from diagnostic and scan log reports generated by SpyHunter.

Volume Count: Similar to the detection count, the Volume Count is specifically based on the number of confirmed and suspected threats infecting systems on a daily basis. High volume counts usually represent a popular threat but may or may not have infected a large number of systems. High detection count threats could lay dormant and have a low volume count. Criteria for Volume Count is relative to a daily detection count.

Trend Path: The Trend Path, utilizing an up arrow, down arrow or equal symbol, represents the level of recent movement of a particular threat. Up arrows represent an increase, down arrows represent a decline and the equal symbol represent no change to a threat's recent movement.

% Impact (Last 7 Days): This demonstrates a 7-day period change in the frequency of a malware threat infecting PCs. The percentage impact correlates directly to the current Trend Path to determine a rise or decline in the percentage.

Threat Level:	10/10
Infected PCs:	375

First Seen:	May 25, 2017
Last Seen:	June 9, 2023
OS(es) Affected:	Windows

The MoWare H.F.D Ransomware is a variant of the Hidden Tear family. Although this threat is a work in progress with incomplete features, malware experts do recommend treating it as a potential threat to both your PC's security and your local files. Having anti-malware security software can help you with deleting the MoWare H.F.D Ransomware before it infects your PC or, in an attack scenario, disinfect your computer.

Watching Prefab Trojans Reverting to Half-Finished Formats

Even when threat actors have all the tools necessary to make a credible build of a threatening application, they sometimes fumble with the final output. With the MoWare H.F.D Ransomware, a new version of the widely-abused Hidden Tear Trojan, malware analysts are seeing a threat that displays some of the symptoms of file-encrypting attacks but omitting the actual encryption. Victims can hope that the early version of the MoWare H.F.D Ransomware never receives any further development that would make it a greater risk to their PC's security.

Thanks to faulty code edits, launching the MoWare H.F.D Ransomware's executable provokes a generic 'runtime error' message from Windows. After that, the MoWare H.F.D Ransomware tries to contact a remote server, possibly to notify the threat actor of the attack or upload the essential encryption information. Although the MoWare H.F.D Ransomware does try to encrypt files, which can make content like documents, pictures or archives unable to open, additional errors prevent this feature from working correctly, as in the original version of Hidden Tear. Another, similarly non-working feature tries and fails to modify their names by appending '.H_F_D_locked' extensions to them.

However, the MoWare H.F.D Ransomware's ransoming pop-up does function as intended. Its most prominent features include a countdown before the ransom increases, an advertised Bitcoin cost of 0.5 (1,387 USD), and a link to the ransom-processing site. Malware experts do verify that current versions of the MoWare H.F.D Ransomware are incapable of encoding any content, which turns paying the ransom or trying to decrypt any local content into an act without benefit.

Making Certain that Half-Finished Trojans Remain Less than Half-Funded

Since all of their changes to the MoWare H.F.D Ransomware only are serving to make this Trojan less functional than the original template of Hidden Tear, this Trojan's threat actors are likely of being highly inexperienced or, at a minimum, careless programmers. At present, no additional file-unlocking or restoration methods should be necessary, and the MoWare H.F.D Ransomware infections can't damage your documents, or other files, by encrypting them. However, any updates to the MoWare H.F.D Ransomware campaign may change such facts even if these patches consist only of reversing the poor decisions of the new threat actors.

Future infection methods that the MoWare H.F.D Ransomware's authors could encompass e-mail attachments, documents with corrupted macros, websites with bad scripts, and free download bundles for other software, among others theoretically. Most of the above strategies are highly limited or blocked outright by PCs protected with standard anti-malware products. Currently, the detection rates for this threat are accurate for roughly half the anti-malware industry, and malware analysts encourage updating all security solutions to raise their chances of success for deleting the MoWare H.F.D Ransomware.

Greed and competence aren't always bedfellows, but even malfunctioning Trojans aren't likely to have accidents in your favor. Which attacks the MoWare H.F.D Ransomware succeeds at causing never should be a concern for PC owners who are doing the simple job of keeping Trojans off their systems entirely.

Technical Details

Registry Modifications

The following newly produced Registry Values are:

HKEY..\..\..\..{RegistryKeys}Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Run\MoWare H.F.DSOFTWARE\Wow6432Node\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Run\MoWare H.F.D

Additional Information

The following directories were created:

%APPDATA%\MoWare_H