All these days we have seen ransomware variants addressed as malware. But in a first of its kind research by Sophos Labs, a new ransomware variant named Zcrypt is being addressed as virus and not a malware.
A malware is a kind of Trojan Horse that looks like a computer program on a surface, but has malicious intentions inside. Such malware cannot perpetuate on their own and are typically spread with human interference via emails, messages or malevolent Webpages.
For Virus, they are programmed to spread on their own by mimicking themselves to other files or directories on the network- like how a viral infection propagates among humans similar to Corona Virus.
Security researchers have found that zCrypt is a self spreading ransomware that has already hit few company networks so far.
One of the Sophos malware detection product has already the Zcrypt ransomware and has sent it to malware experts related to the law enforcement agencies located across the world. The company has also reiterated the fact that the spread has been minimal in the wild and has confirmed that the virus is not spreading on an effective note- like how the other viruses do.
Using Email filters, by not clicking on suspicious web links, never opening .ZIP files and .EXE files sent through messages and emails makes complete sense in such situations say security experts.
Also, those in security field recommend maintaining regular data backups and that too advice to keep a copy of such backed up data offsite- such as on cloud platforms; as it helps in recovering from any kind of ransomware attacks.
