Ransomware

[Norton]

Quick question. I was just thinking after yesterdays post on Sage Ransomware.
If you are unfortunate to get infected with ransomware, will it also infect connected external USB HDs
and, or USB Thumb drives?
I always turn off my external HDs and eject Thumb drives but leave them connected to the USB ports.

 

[Trouble]

I'm pretty sure it goes after everything on the computer regardless of the path.
I've even heard of it impacting mapped network drives as well as recently damage to (according to some reports) dropbox, gdrive, and such cloud based containers, which I would guess if you have them mapped it's possible.

I have two 2 TB drives that I use for my backups (really just images).
One (a standard desktop hard drive) I use in a USB 3.0 dock and the other is a portable WD Elements USB 3.0.
Neither of which do I leave connected to the computer once the imaging is done, although .tib which is the file extension Acronis uses, I haven't seen on a list of impacted file extensions..... yet.
I suspect it is only a matter of time before .tib, .vhd, .vhdx and other backup formats will be included in files that will be attacked.

 

[Norton]

Yes! I also heard of dropbox, gdrive, and cloud based containers, being infected by ransomware, that's what had me questioning infection of USB devices.
I'm a bit of a safety freak, so from now I think I will be unplugging my USB devices after imaging and back-ups are complete.

 

[Bif]

I might also add that vice versaly my old laptop was infected by an mp3 file loaded on my USB drive that a friend had downloaded and had given me.
I even scanned it with AVG and Malwarebytes at the time and it showed as clean... Can't remember off hand which nasty it was ( Trojan variant ) but it was not easy to get rid of.

 

[Trouble]

a friend had downloaded and had given me

With friends like that......

 

[Data]

I might also add that vice versaly my old laptop was infected by an mp3 file loaded on my USB drive that a friend had downloaded and had given me.

There is a new ransomware named Popcorn Time which you may have heard about, that instead of paying to get files unencrypted, you also have the option to spread the ransomware to two other people and get your files unencrypted for free.

Source: https://thehackernews.com/2016/12/ransomware-malware.html
Another Ransomware, unlocks your files if you read cyber security articles
https://thehackernews.com/2016/12/ransomware-malware.html
Source: https://thehackernews.com/2017/01/decrypt-ransomware-files.html