New ransomware forces targets to play PUBG to get their files back

While most ransomware is designed to squeeze money out of victims, a new ransomware discovered this week simply wants you to play PUBG. This week, the folks at MalwareHunterTeam discovered new ‘PUBG Ransomware', which does exactly what you would expect it to do- it holds your files hostage until you play a round of PlayerUnknown's Battlegrounds.

When the PUBG Ransomware is launched, it encrypts the files and folders on your desktop and adds a .PUBG extension to them. Once encryption has completed, it will display a screen giving you two options to get your files back. You can either enter the ‘restore code' which is displayed, or you can play some PUBG. The instructions ask that you play for an hour, Bleeping Computer found that you only actually need to run the game for a few seconds.

The software monitors your PCs ongoing processes, looking for one called ‘TslGame'. Once it detects this process, files will automatically be decrypted. Theoretically if you were to be hit with this, you could run any executable called TslGame.exe and get your files back.

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KitGuru Says: We still don't know whether or not this will be spread or not, but for now, it appears to just be a joke. If it does ever begin circulating in public, it's easy enough to get around. 

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