ARIZONA Virus (.AZ files) — How to remove Ransomware?

The Arizona virus belongs to the ransomware type of infection. Ransomware of such sort encrypts all the data on your PC (images, text files, excel sheets, music, videos, etc) and adds its extra extension to every file, leaving the README.txt text files in each directory containing encrypted files.

Arizona virus: what is known so far?

☝️ A strictly correct denomination for the Arizona would be “a ransomware infection”.

Arizona will add its extra .AZ extension to every file’s title. For example, a file named “photo.jpg” will be altered to “photo.jpg.AZ”. Just like the Excel file with the name “table.xlsx” will be changed to “table.xlsx.AZ”, and so forth.

In each directory with the encrypted files, a README.txt file will be found. It is a ransom money note. Therein you can find information on the ways of paying the ransom and some other information. The ransom note most probably contains instructions on how to buy the decryption tool from the tamperers. That is how they do it.

Arizona summary:

In the screenshot below, you can see what a folder with files encrypted by the Arizona looks like. Each filename has the “.AZ” extension appended to it.

How did my machine catch Arizona ransomware?

There are many possible ways of ransomware infiltration.

Nowadays, there are three most popular ways for hackers to have the Arizona virus acting in your system. These are email spam, Trojan injection and peer networks.

If you access your inbox and see emails that look like familiar notifications from utility services companies, postal agencies like FedEx, Internet providers, and whatnot, but whose mailer is unknown to you, be wary of opening those letters. They are very likely to have a harmful file enclosed in them. Therefore, it is even riskier to download any attachments that come with letters like these.

As for the peer-to-peer file transfer protocols like torrents or eMule, the threat is that they are even more trust-based than the rest of the Web. You can never guess what you download until you get it. Our suggestion is that you use trustworthy websites. Also, it is a good idea to scan the directory containing the downloaded files with the antivirus as soon as the downloading is done.

How to remove the Arizona virus?

It is important to note that besides encrypting your data, the Arizona virus will probably install the Azorult Spyware on your computer to get access to credentials to various accounts (including cryptocurrency wallets). The mentioned program can derive your logins and passwords from your browser’s auto-filling cardfile.

Often racketeers would decrypt several of your files to prove that they do have the decryption tool. As Arizona virus is a relatively new ransomware, safety measures engineers have not yet found a way to reverse its work. Nevertheless, the decoding instruments are frequently updated, so the solution may soon be available.

Understandably, if the criminals do the job of encrypting someone’s essential data, the desperate person will most likely fulfill their demands. Despite that, paying to criminals does not necessarily mean that you’re getting your files back. It is still risky. After receiving the money, the racketeers may send a wrong decryption key to the victim. There were reports about hackers just disappearing after getting the ransom without even bothering to reply.

The optimal countermeasure to ransomware is to have a system restore point or the copies of your critical files in the cloud storage or at least on an external storage. Of course, that might be not enough. The most crucial thing could be that one you were working upon when it all started. But at least it is something. It is also reasonable to scan your drives with the antivirus program after the OS restoration.

There are other ransomware products, besides Arizona, that work similarly. Examples of those are Dehd, Zaqi, Sbpg, and some others. The two main differences between them and the Arizona are the ransom amount and the encoding method. The rest is the same: files become inaccessible, their extensions changed, ransom notes appear in each folder containing encrypted files.

Some fortunate users were able to decode the blocked files with the aid of the free tools provided by anti-ransomware experts. Sometimes the criminals accidentally send the decryption key to the wronged in the ransom readme. Such an epic fail allows the victim to restore the files. But obviously, one should never expect such a chance. Make no mistake, ransomware is a criminals’ tool to lay their hands on the money of their victims.

How do I avoid ransomware attack?

Arizona ransomware has no superpower, so as any similar malware.

You can protect yourself from its infiltration in several easy steps:

• Never open any emails from unknown mailers with strange addresses, or with content that has nothing to do with something you are expecting (how can you win in a money prize draw without participating in it?). In case the email subject is more or less something you are waiting for, scrutinize all elements of the suspicious email with caution. A fake letter will surely have a mistake.
• Never use cracked or unknown software. Trojan viruses are often spreaded as a part of cracked software, possibly as a “patch” to prevent the license check. But dubious programs are difficult to distinguish from reliable ones, because trojans may also have the functionality you seek. Try to find information on this program on the anti-malware message boards, but the optimal way is not to use such programs at all.

Reasons why I would recommend GridinSoft²

Download Removal Tool.

Run the setup file.

Press “Install” button.

Once installed, Anti-Malware will automatically run.

Wait for the Anti-Malware scan to complete.

Click on “Clean Now”.

Frequently Asked Questions

🤔 How can I open “.AZ” files?Is it possible to open“.AZ” files?

There’s no way to do it, unless the files “.AZ” files are decrypted.

🤔 I really need to decrypt those “.AZ” files ASAP. How can I do that?

It’s good if you have fаr-sightedly saved copies of these important files elsewhere. Otherwise, you might try to employ System Restore. The only question is whether you have saved any Restore Points that would be helpful now. All other solutions require time.

🤔 What to do if the Arizona virus has blocked my computer and I can’t get the activation code.

🤔 And what should I do now?

Many of the blocked files might still be at your disposal

• If you sent or received your critical files via email, you could still download them from your online mailbox.
• You might have shared images or videos with your friends or family members. Just ask them to give those images back to you.
• If you have initially got any of your files from the Web, you can try downloading them again.
• Your messengers, social networks pages, and cloud storage might have all those files too.
• It might be that you still have the needed files on your old PC, a laptop, cellphone, flash memory, etc.

USEFUL TIP: You can employ file recovery utilities⁴ to retrieve your lost information since ransomware arrests the copies of your files, deleting the original ones. In the tutorial below, you can learn how to recover your files with PhotoRec, but be advised: you won’t be able to do it before you kill the virus with an anti-malware program.

Also, you can contact the following governmental fraud and scam sites to report this attack:

• In the United States: On Guard Online;
• In Canada: Canadian Anti-Fraud Centre;
• In the United Kingdom: Action Fraud;
• In Australia: SCAMwatch;
• In New Zealand: Consumer Affairs Scams;
• In France: Agence nationale de la sécurité des systèmes d’information;
• In Germany: Bundesamt für Sicherheit in der Informationstechnik;
• In Ireland: An Garda Síochána;

To report the attack, you can contact local executive boards. For instance, if you live in USA, you can have a talk with FBI Local field office, IC3 or Secret Service.

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