Some of the most pernicious versions of malware are known as ransomware, which hold your computer or files hostage until you pay the creators some of your hard-earned cash. Some of them even utilize strong cryptography to garble your files until you pay up, and that’s the case with the latest bit of Ransomware. What’s different this time is that this ransomware makes reference to the wildly popular TV series Breaking Bad.
It’s called PolloCrypt and uses the logo from Los Pollos Hermanos, the fast food chain from the show secretly owned by a drug kingpin.If your Windows PC gets infected with PolloCrypt, it goes through all your personal files and encrypts them with a private key that only the malware authors have. In order to get the key and decrypt your files, you need to transfer money via Bitcoin to a provided address. Like some other successful ransomware schemes, PolloCrypt offers a two-tier payment system. You can pay immediately and get your data for just $450 AUD (about $354), but if you wait too long, the price goes up to $1,000 AUD ($787). Scammers have found this approach gets more response because people feel like they’re getting a deal if they pay the lower price.
PolloCrypt also shows the victim a list of the encrypted files on their system, and offers to decrypt one file for free as proof that it’s possible. A disclaimer in the malware’s payment screen plays the same card used by CryptoLocker, another recent ransomware infection. It explains that the authors of PolloCrypt are trying to run a business here, so what reason do they have to screw you over after you pay up? Is this the modern equivalent of honor among thieves? The encryption used by PolloCrypt isn’t completely ironclad. There’s a chance that the encryption can be bypassed without paying, but tampering with the malware also risks the destruction of your files. It’s just not a nice thing to do, holding your computer hostage and also besmirching the name of a fictional drug front we’ve all grown to love.