Latvijas Policijas Virus Ransomware

Latvijas Policijas Virus Ransomware Image

ESG malware analysts have observed that ransomware Trojan attacks in Eastern Europe have increased in the last couple of months. The Latvijas Policijas Virus is one of the many newer variants of the PaySafeCard or Ukash ransomware Trojans that have started targeting these countries. As of November of 2012, ESG security researchers have received reports of ransomware infections impersonating police agencies from Hungary, Romania, Slovenia and other Eastern European countries. The Latvijas Policijas Virus is the variant of this ransomware family that targets computers located in Latvia. This malicious ransomware infection detects the victim's location by its IP address and installs a variant of this scam that corresponds to the victim's computer. These are typically referred to as 'Ukash' ransomware Trojans because they often demand the payment of a ransom using this money transfer service.

Fake threatening messages from the police are tactics criminals use to alarm inexperienced computer users. These messages will typically claim that the victim's computer was involved in criminal activity and will threaten with deleting the contents of the victim's hard drive and forwarding the contents of it to the police. More importantly, the Latvijas Policijas Virus and other ransomware Trojans prevent the victim from gaining access to the infected computer, effectively shutting down access to all files and applications on the victim's PC. ESG malware researchers advise computer users never to pay the Latvijas Policijas Virus' ransom, even if you understand that the Latvijas Policijas Virus is not a real police operation and you only do it with the intention of unblocking your computer. ESG malware researchers have analyzed the Latvijas Policijas Virus and have determined that there is not engineering to access payment codes and that following its instructions will not remove this ransomware Trojan from your computer.

The most problematic aspect of dealing with the Latvijas Policijas Virus is bypassing this Trojan's ransom message and accessing your files and security programs. Fortunately, Windows allows computer users to access the Command Prompt by starting up in Safe Mode. This allows computer users to gain access to the Windows Registry and to the Windows Explorer, both of which can allow computer users to disable the Latvijas Policijas Virus message and acquire access to your security applications. An alternative method is to start up Windows from an alternate source, i.e. an external drive or CD.