Welcome to our Zcryptor removal instructions. This article intends to help you remove Zcryptor from your system and is designed to work for all Windows versions.
So, you’ve switched on your computer and out of the blue you find yourself staring at a disturbing message saying something about lost access to certain files and demanding… wait, what? Ransom?! For a decryption key to your own files?!
That can be quite disturbing, we’ll agree with you on that. Unfortunately, you’ve come in touch with one of the worst computer viruses out there – Zcryptor. Zcryptor belongs to the class of ransomware (you’re probably figured out where it gets the name from by now), which just so happens to be one of the most common types of malware available. Viruses of this type generate millions of dollars every year and the tendency seems to be a growing one, as recent studies have shown. The amount of new ransomware samples appearing is growing like weed and the authorities aren’t really successful in keeping up with it. We don’t aim to frighten you, though – that’s the hackers’ job. We’re merely giving you some insight as those who are forewarned are forearmed. We also offer you a solution to this problem, which you will find further down on this page. It includes instructions that will allow you to remove Zcryptor from your computer and also recover your coded files.
About Zcryptor
Like other viruses of the ransomware category, Zcryptor typically invades your computer with the help of Trojan horses. These are another sneaky weapon in the arsenal of cyber criminals and a very effective one at that. Most commonly, they are sent to you via email and will lure you into opening the attachment in the given email. You probably won’t even suspect there might be something wrong, because the attachment can be a Word or PDF document, which to most people seems totally innocent. So, once you’ve opened the attachment you have allowed the Trojan to stealthily download Zcryptor onto your PC. Your consent will obviously not be asked for and you won’t know what hit you until it’s already too late. Unless you’re very luck and happen to have a relatively weak processor with a bunch of info stored on it. In that case your computer will be immensely slowed down, because ransomware tends to use up a lot of your computer’s memory, while coding your files. In the event that you’ve noticed some abnormal slacking in performance, open the Task Manager and monitor it for any suspicious program using up a lot of RAM. Found one? Shut down your system. Immediately. Seek out a professional to help you deal with the issue and don’t switch your machine back on until you do.
But that should remain for future reference, since you’re obviously not here because you suspect you might be infected with ransomware. However, it wouldn’t hurt to know other possible ways you can get infected by. Another commonly applied tactic is called program bundling and involves the process of packaging one program with another. For instance, you go about searching for some cracked program and find it on a shady website with other such content. You then download that program and along with it comes another one, which wasn’t mentioned in the description. This ‘other’ one could be a virus, could be a potentially unwanted program (PUP), could even be something fairly harmless – but you still have no way of knowing that until it’s already there. What to do then? The obvious answer would be to stay away from murky sites like the one described above and be very careful with the content you download, paying extreme attention to its source.
Conclusion
We recommend you to think first before you opt for emptying your wallet for the benefit of some cyber criminal, who’s sitting in his basement harassing people for money. As pointed out, the legal authorities are struggling to put a leash on this phenomenon, but it doesn’t look like they will prevail any time soon. So why aid the hackers further by funding their evil schemes? The least you can do is try an alternative method of retrieving your files, like the one we have for you here. We can assure you that it will by the very least not harm your files or alter them in any way. The worst that can happen is it will merely not succeed in decrypting all of your files, but there is a chance that it might. And we won’t charge you for it either.
| Threat | Zcryptor |
| Classification | Ransomware |
| Security Alert |
High. |
| Negative Effects | The encryption of most of your files. In certain rare cases you might be able to detect it, if your computer becomes extremely slow. |
Zcryptor Ransomware Removal
Reveal Hidden Files. If you don’t know how to do this, ask us in the comments.
=> Search=> Copy/Paste “notepad %windir%/system32/Drivers/etc/hosts” => Enter.
If you notice other IPs different from the localhost IPs – you might be in danger!
Ask for additional help in the comments.
Right click on the Taskbar => Start Task Manager.
Navigate to Processes.
Locate any suspicious processes associated with Zcryptor. Right click on the process = > Open File Location => End Process = > Delete the directories with the suspicious files.
=> Search => Type:
- %AppData%
- %LocalAppData%
- %ProgramData%
- %WinDir%
- %Temp%
Hit Enter after each new search. Check each Folder and delete recent entries.
Get Your Files Back!
The only way you can do that is by backpedaling to a moment when you were not infected. You can achieve this in one of two ways:
- System Restore. => Search field => Type System Restore => Enter.
Choose a Restore Point.
Click Next until the process has been completed. - Google and Download a Program called ShadowExplorer. Install and open it => Choose the Drive letter (C:, D:, F:, etc.) and date you want to restore information from => Right click on the files you want restored => Export.
If you run into any trouble – ask us for help in the comments section!
