Symbiom Ransomware

Posted: July 27, 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:	26

First Seen:	July 27, 2017
OS(es) Affected:	Windows

The Symbiom Ransomware is a variant of Hidden Tear that uses the AES encryption to keep you from opening files, after which it asks you to pay to unlock them. This threat is likely to infect your PC after you open fake gaming software, such as cheating tools for Blizzard product particularly. Scanning new downloads with anti-malware programs that would remove the Symbiom Ransomware immediately, as well as saving backups of your work elsewhere, can keep this threat from damaging your PC's media.

Con Artists Watching over Gaming Trends for Inspiration

Due to creating predictable trends in traffic that threat actors can take advantage of, even the video game industry isn't 'all fun and games' necessarily. Old Blizzard products ranging from Diablo 3 to the WoW MMO have been targets of old spyware, including the login data-collecting W32.Gammima.AG. Now, malware experts also are seeing con artists implementing similar techniques in how they distribute their file-blocking threats like the Symbiom Ransomware.

The Symbiom Ransomware is another Trojan basing its code almost entirely off of Hidden Tear, whose original development was meant to demonstrate, without deploying, the potential of threatening, non-consensual encryption for holding files hostage. Accordingly, the Symbiom Ransomware follows the usual standards of, first, encrypting the victim's local data with an AES-based cipher and injecting '.symbiom_ransomware_locked' extensions into the ends of the filenames. The Trojan also creates a Notepad file asking for 0.1 Bitcoins transferred to the threat actor's wallet, which, in theory, could cause the con artist to provide a decryption solution.

Although the Symbiom Ransomware's payload has minimal attributes of any noteworthiness, malware experts found more of interest in the original names of the available samples. These names label the executable as a cheating tool for Blizzard's Overwatch team-based shooter falsely. However, the Symbiom Ransomware's interface has no major deviations from the default Hidden Tear configuration and doesn't attempt to distract the victim by generating a fake hacking tool UI while it's encrypting the computer's media.

Maintaining a Steady Watch on Your Files

Threats using the Symbiom Ransomware's strategy are more often found circulating in torrents and corrupted websites that may format themselves to look like free, piracy-oriented domains. Anti-malware products may block both threatening domains according to their Web addresses or content, and identify the Symbiom Ransomware or installers for it if you allow them to scan all downloads before opening them. PC users with any significant interest in using free download resources like torrents also should keep in mind that illicit downloads associated with popular media products, such as prominent games and movies, are frequent carriers of threatening software.

Malware experts never recommend relying solely on decryption to keep your files safe. Although the Symbiom Ransomware's family of Hidden Tear often is open to free decryptors, other file-blocking threats may use different means of blocking content (such as the MMM Ransomware's combination of the AES, RSA and HMAC). Routinely backing up your files to another device will let you recover them without needing to break the encryption cipher. Any anti-malware product capable of dealing with Hidden Tear's previous versions also should remove the Symbiom Ransomware automatically.

In a combative environment, it can be tempting to want a helping hand over other players. However, con artists are eager to take advantage of those temptations, which lead to a path directly to the Symbiom Ransomware and Trojans like it all too frequently.

Technical Details

File System Modifications

Tutorials: If you wish to learn how to remove malware components manually, you can read the tutorials on how to find malware, kill unwanted processes, remove malicious DLLs and delete other harmful files. Always be sure to back up your PC before making any changes.

The following files were created in the system:

file.exe

File name: file.exe
Size: 483.84 KB (483840 bytes)
MD5: 89ef6b98c7e352d6b23573bd6d008298
Detection count: 36
File type: Executable File
Mime Type: unknown/exe
Group: Malware file
Last Updated: July 27, 2017