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- TorrentLocker and Its Effect on the Australian Web Threat Landscape
View research paper: Australian Web Threat Landscape
TorrentLocker refers to a strain of ransomware that uses encryption in order to extort money from its victims. It is considered a regional threat with infections found in many regions, with some of the most recent ones being spotted in Australia.
Analysis of the outbreaks show that the location of the infection is not happenstance, as the social engineering and email addresses involved specifically targeted individuals and businesses in Australia. This paper provides insights into a series of TorrentLocker outbreaks, as well as its effects on the Australian web threat landscape.
General Attack Scenario:
Web Threat Landscape Analysis and TorrentLocker Impact
In light of this, we discovered the following findings about the web threat landscape of the country:
Conclusion
This report explored various aspects of threats in the Australian web landscape. We have provided statistics on the volume and timing of web threats impacting Australia.
Even if our findings showed that the overall web threat landscape of Australia was not too drastically affected by the TorrentLocker outbreak, the malware remains a serious threat to users around the world, and should be taken seriously.
Based on the evasion techniques used and the outbreaks that adapted to security measures, we see multilayer filtering as a more robust approach to protecting users from TorrentLocker variants. In addition, further research is needed to monitor and document the evasion techniques being used and their impact on Australia.
For a much more detailed look on our findings and their implications to Australian users and businesses, download the full paper on the Australian Web Threat Landscape.
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