What is Explorer Ransomware?
The entrance of Explorer Ransomware, a nasty computer infection, might be the reason you can no longer open such files as images, documents, music, and movies. Actually, there is no doubt that this infection is active on your system if these files you cannot access have a new extension .explorer appended next to their original extensions. Most probably, this infection has entered your computer because you have opened a malicious attachment from a spam email accidentally or willingly. No matter how this has happened, you are not allowed to keep this ransomware infection active on your system because you might launch this threat again accidentally and get even more personal files locked. Other malicious applications might slither onto your computer easier as well if there is already malware inside the system. Ransomware infections do not have uninstallers, so victims usually have to put some effort into their removal. Do not worry if you are not very experienced in malware removal because you will find detailed information regarding the Explorer Ransomware removal provided further in this report.
What does Explorer Ransomware do?
Explorer Ransomware is another ransomware infection based on HiddenTear, an open-source ransomware infection whose source code can be easily accessed by anyone interested. Because of this, malware researchers did not need much time to find out how this threat acts. According to them, this infection is a typical ransomware infection. That is, it encrypts files after the entrance. It is the main activity it performs on compromised machines, but it is not the only one. All victims of this malicious application also notice a new image set as Desktop background and a file READ_IT.txt on Desktops. Both the image set and the .txt file contain the ransom note. If users read any of them, they find out what has happened to their files – they have been encrypted using a strong encryption algorithm. The ransom note also contains some information about the decryption of files. Users are told to write an email to decrypter.files@mail.ru if they want to get their files back. Even though users are not directly told about the ransom they will have to pay, the following sentence leaves no doubt that paying money to cyber criminals behind the ransomware infection is the only way to decrypt files: “If you Email Us in less than 24 hours , you will be paying half the regular price.” You should not send them your money no matter how badly you need to get your files back because there might a free way to restore them. Unfortunately, only those users who have copies of those encrypted files can do that.
Where does Explorer Ransomware come from?
The majority of users know nothing about the entrance of Explorer Ransomware, but, frankly speaking, they are usually the ones who allow this ransomware infection to enter their computers. It is already known that ransomware infections might be waiting for users on file-sharing websites collaborating with cyber criminals or they might be dropped on users’ PCs by other threats; however, there is basically no doubt that these threats are mainly spread via spam emails. We are not surprised at all that you have encountered this malicious application if you remember opening an attachment from a received email before discovering files encrypted. Ransomware is only one of several types of malicious software you can encounter if you keep opening spam emails and their attachments, so ignore them all completely from now on! Additionally, you should install a security application on your computer to make sure that your PC is safe.
How to remove Explorer Ransomware
Explorer Ransomware does not drop any additional files, except for READ_IT.txt, on victims’ Desktops. Also, it does not lock the screen and such utilities as Task Manager. Because of this, it should not be extremely hard to erase this infection. Actually, according to specialists working at anti-spyware-101.com, it should be enough to delete recently downloaded suspicious files and READ_IT.txt from Desktop. Below-provided manual removal guide should make the removal of the ransomware infection considerably easier, but you can, of course, delete this infection automatically too if you do not have time for the manual removal of this infection or simply do not feel experienced enough to erase the threat from the system manually.
Delete Explorer Ransomware
- Press Win+E to open Explorer.
- Open %USERPROFILE%\Desktop.
- Delete recently downloaded files.
- Go to %USERPROFILE%\Downloads.
- Repeat the 3rd step.
- Remove READ_IT.txt from Desktop (%USERPROFILE%\Desktop).
- Empty Recycle bin.
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