Hijacked Laptop

[fatgaz]

hi peeps, my son has just informed me that over the weekend his laptop for collage was hijacked by some form of program that has altered his pictures doc's and other files and is asking for 900 odd quid to unlock them. he either doesnt know or wont say what web site it came from ??, he can get some of his course work back but not all, he says all affected files have powd on the end of them, I have told him to go and see the collage tech guys to see if they can help him out and I would ask you guy's as well,
couple of questions
1) is there any way to unlock them with out paying
2)can he lock folders to stop it happening again
thanks in advance for any advice

[nero2024]

if he gets it unlocked. back up everything on an external hard drive that means "everything"it easy to do then if this happens again just reinstall the whole back up . did he have any security on his laptop ?

[fatgaz]

Hi nero ty for the reply, he had all of his course work on an external drive as I advised him but it was left plugged in when he got hijacked or what ever its called and as far as I am aware he only had windows defender I think but not sure exactly, do you know if its poss to lock individual folders or the whole ext hard drive and then unlock it to save/delete as and when required and if so would that stop the hijacking process from altering his files ?

[Peter Pedant]

the geeks at his college are likely to be of more help.
yes there are ways around this - the geeks know

back up - I do mine every fortnight rotating 5 usbs

oh and tell him to stay off mucky sites, dirty boy!
no wonder he wont say where he has been
( in an ublocked ctr - control H gives the past sites visited )

[fatgaz]

cheers peter, thanks for the reply, if I can get hold of his laptop I will try the ctrl + h thing, just tried it on mine a very useful tool ty for the info

[Buenchico]

See here:
https://geeksadvice.com/remove-powd-ransomware-virus/
and here
https://geeksadvice.com/decrypt-files-locked-by-stop-djvu-ransomware-virus/

If the procedures suggested there look as if they might work in your son's case, he'll need this free software to give it a try:
https://www.emsisoft.com/en/ransomware-decryption/stop-djvu

[nero2024]

windows defender is as good as any around with the possible exception of "paid for" security

[fatgaz]

buenchico ty so much for pointing him in the right direction will also see what the tech guy's say from his collage, much appreciated all the advice about this infection, any thoughts on being able to lock/unlock the external hard drive to maybe stop this happening again if thats poss ??

[twix123]

"any thoughts on being able to lock/unlock the external hard drive to maybe stop this happening again if thats poss ??"

If it is mostly his college work on the external hard drive, just switch it off or unplug it when not doing college work. Also do a back up to a pen drive or a cloud account.

[fatgaz]

hi twix 123, yeah thats what I told him to do but kids will be kids :) just wondering if there was a program that locks a folder or the hard drive with a right click and selecting lock/unlock from the menu that appears and would that stop those files from being infected, by the way ty for the reply as well

[twix123]

If he can't be bothered to manually turn off or unplug his external hard drive, I very much doubt that he would go to the trouble of clicking on a disabling facility (if one exists - Buenchico may know the answer to that!).
He will have to live and learn to be security conscious if he doesn't want the same thing happening again.

[fatgaz]

Hi twix, totally agree with you, the techy guys said there isnt much they can do because its an "online key" all they have done is loaded his assingments onto a mem stick for him to put onto his laptop once he is sure its clean, but he will have to re do them over again, lesson learnt me thinks (hopefully)