The head of the Cybersecurity Committee at the Kuwaiti Electronic Media Union, Muhammad Al-Rashidi, has warned of a “spreading virus that is a ransomware link that claims to have a video of scenes of the earthquake that recently struck Turkey and Syria,” revealing that “a number of Kuwaiti companies have fallen victim to this virus, and money have been requested” to decode this encryption.
Al-Rashidi told Al-Rai daily, that “once the link is opened, all files are encrypted and money is requested in exchange for decrypting this encryption,” pointing out that “hackers are taking advantage of global events to encrypt files, use social engineering, and make fake links to watch videos of the global event, such as Earthquakes, and the device is hacked and given a 24-hour deadline with the threat that in the event of non-payment, the files will be completely destroyed, whether personal or company files.
Regarding how to act in such cases, Al-Rashidi stated that “payment is a big mistake because there is no guarantee of decryption after payment, and “we recommend resorting to international companies specialized in decryption to reopen it, and this may cost large sums, but it is better than paying hackers.”