Yikes! Adobe Flash bug is money-stealing malware
May 24, 2016
Shah Sheikh (1294 articles)
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Yikes! Adobe Flash bug is money-stealing malware

You need to know about this serious online security threat. We recently told you about an emergency security patch for Adobe Flash that dealt with a zero-day vulnerability. That means hackers found the security weakness before Adobe did.

While Adobe has since sent out fixes for it, hackers have weaponized it. They’re using the hole to trick you out of your money and your identity with ransomware, banking malware and a trojan that steals your online banking logins and passwords.

This threat has been found so far in three exploit kits, which use security holes to spread malware. They’re Neutrino, Magnitude and Angler.

The cybersecurity expert who discovered these exploits says they’re being used to infect your computer with ransomware like CryptXXX and DMA Locker, plus the Gootkit Trojan, which steals your online banking credentials.

As of this morning, most antivirus programs were not able to detect Neutrino. Note: Keep reading for important information to stay safe.

The Magnitude exploit is so far not working correctly. That’s good for you. However, hackers are trying to exploit Adobe Flash and will almost certainly fix it.

Meantime, Angler is spreading the Dridex banking trojan that hackers have used to drain at least $30 million from bank accounts and credit union accounts.

This is scary. Dridex is usually spread in Microsoft Office documents and is passed along in emails. (Note: Do you know how to spot phishing email scams?)

Here’s what you need to do:

  1. If you don’t need it, uninstall Adobe Flash Player. To do that on Windows 10, for instance: Start >> Settings >> search for Uninstall >> click on Add or Remove Programs >> highlight Adobe Flash Player >> Uninstall.
  2. For older versions of Windows: Start >> Control Panel >> (under Programs) Uninstall a program >> highlight Adobe Flash Player >> click Uninstall.
  3. If you need to use Adobe Flash Player, update your version right now. Click here to get the newest version of Adobe Flash.

Bonus: Make sure you have the strongest Internet security system you can get. We recommend our sponsor Kaspersky Lab. More than 400 million people and 270,000 businesses worldwide use Kaspersky Lab products to protect your digital lives.

Even better, software from Kaspersky Lab can recognize and block ransomware. Even if it’s a new version of a ransomware, or an unknown ransomware, Kaspersky Lab can figure out that the program is doing something it shouldn’t. Kaspersky Lab will stop it from running and will roll back any files that were encrypted to a previous non-encrypted version.

Of course, Kaspersky Lab software also helps filter out and warn you about phishing scams, so your odds of even downloading a ransomware virus are slim.

Use the Internet security software we use at home and at the studios. Click here to get protected now and save 50 percent.

Source | Komando