Attackers are persistent and motivated to continuously evolve –
Microsoft’s mobile threat defense capabilities further enrich the visibility that organizations have on threats in their networks, as well as provide more tools to detect and respond to threats across domains and across platforms. Like all of Microsoft’s security solutions, these new capabilities are likewise backed by a global network of threat researchers and security experts whose deep understanding of the threat landscape guide the continuous innovation of security features and ensure that customers are protected from ever-evolving threats.
For example, we found a piece of a particularly sophisticated Android ransomware with novel techniques and behavior, exemplifying the rapid evolution of mobile threats that we have also observed on other platforms. The mobile ransomware is the latest variant of a ransomware family that’s been in the wild for a while but has been evolving non-stop. This ransomware family is known for being hosted on arbitrary websites and circulated on online forums using various social engineering lures, including masquerading as popular apps, cracked games, or video players. The new variant caught our attention because it’s an advanced malware with unmistakable malicious characteristic and behavior and yet manages to evade many available protections, registering a low detection rate against security solutions.
As with most Android ransomware, this new threat doesn’t actually block access to files by encrypting them. Instead, it blocks access to devices by displaying a screen that appears over every other window, such that the user can’t do anything else. The said screen is the ransom note, which contains threats and instructions to pay the ransom.
What’s innovative about this ransomware is how it displays its ransom note. In this blog, we’ll detail the innovative ways in which this ransomware surfaces its ransom note using Android features we haven’t seen leveraged by malware before, as well as incorporating an open-source machine learning module designed for context-aware cropping of its ransom note.
To read the full article on Microsoft SECURITY Blog go to https://www.microsoft.com/security/blog/2020/10/08/sophisticated-new-android-malware-marks-the-latest-evolution-of-mobile-ransomware/