The Frendi virus falls under the Phobos ransomware family. A harmful program of such sort encrypts all the data on your PC (photos, text files, excel sheets, audio files, videos, etc) and appends its extra extension to every file, leaving the Encrypted.txt files in each directory containing encrypted files.
What is Frendi virus?
âïž A strictly accurate denomination for the Frendi is âa Phobos family ransomware-type malicious agentâ.
The renaming will be done by the following pattern: ID-XXXXXX.[contact_email].Frendi. During the encryption, a file named, for instance, âreport.docxâ will be renamed to âreport.docx.ID-1E857D00.[[email protected]].Frendiâ.
In every folder that contains the encoded files, a Encrypted.txt file will appear. It is a ransom money memo. Therein you can find information on the ways of contacting the racketeers and some other remarks. The ransom note usually contains instructions on how to buy the decryption tool from the racketeers. You can obtain this tool after contacting [email protected] via email. That is basically the scheme of the felony.
Frendi abstract:
| Name | Frendi Virus |
| Ransomware family1 | Phobos ransomware |
| Extension | .Frendi |
| Ransomware note | Encrypted.txt |
| Contact | [email protected] |
| Detection | Crytex.Virus.FileInfector.DDS, Win32/Filecoder.OLC, Malware-Cryptor.InstallCore.5 |
| Symptoms | Your files (photos, videos, documents) have a .Frendi extension and you canât open them. |
| Fix Tool | See If Your System Has Been Affected by Frendi virus |
The Encrypted.txt file coming in package with the Frendi malware states the following:
All your files have been encrypted due to a security problem with your PC. If you want to restore them, write us to the e-mail [email protected] In case of no answer in 24 hours write us to theese e-mails: [email protected] If there is no response from our mail, you can install the Jabber client and write to us in support of [email protected] or [email protected]
In the picture below, you can see what a directory with files encrypted by the Frendi looks like. Each filename has the â.Frendiâ extension appended to it.
An example of encrypted .Frendi files.
How did Frendi ransomware end up on my PC?
There are plenty of possible ways of ransomware infiltration.
Nowadays, there are three most exploited ways for evil-doers to have the Frendi virus acting in your digital environment. These are email spam, Trojan injection and peer-to-peer file transfer.
If you open your inbox and see letters that look like familiar notifications from utility services companies, postal agencies like FedEx, Internet providers, and whatnot, but whose âfromâ field is strange to you, be wary of opening those emails. They are most likely to have a ransomware file attached to them. Thus it is even riskier to open any attachments that come with letters like these.
As for the peer networks like torrents or eMule, the threat is that they are even more trust-based than the rest of the Internet. You can never know what you download until you get it. Our suggestion is that you use trustworthy resources. Also, it is reasonable to scan the directory containing the downloaded items with the antivirus as soon as the downloading is done.
How to remove the Frendi virus?
It is important to inform you that besides encrypting your files, the Frendi virus will probably install the Azorult Spyware on your PC to get access to credentials to various accounts (including cryptocurrency wallets). The mentioned program can derive your logins and passwords from your browserâs auto-filling data.
Sometimes tamperers would unblock several of your files to prove that they do have the decryption program. Since Frendi virus is a relatively new ransomware, safety measures engineers have not yet found a method to undo its work. Nevertheless, the anti-ransomware tools are constantly updated, so the effective countermeasure may soon be available.
Of course, if the hackers succeed in encoding victimâs critical data, the desperate person will most likely fulfill their demands. Despite that, paying to criminals gives no guarantee that youâre getting your files back. It is still dangerous. After receiving the money, the racketeers may send a wrong decryption code to the victim. There were reports of criminals just disappearing after getting the money without even writing back.
The optimal safety measure against ransomware is to have aan OS restore point or the copies of your critical files in the cloud drive or at least on an external disk. Surely, that might be insufficient. The most important thing could be that file you were working on when it all went down. But at least it is something. It is also reasonable to scan your PC for viruses with the antivirus program after the system restoration.
Frendi is not the only ransomware of its kind, since there are other specimens of ransomware out there that act in the same manner. For instance, Maos, Isal, Znto, and some others. The two basic differences between them and the Frendi are the ransom amount and the method of encryption. The rest is almost identical: documents become encoded, their extensions altered, ransom notes emerge in every directory containing encoded files.
Some lucky people were able to decode the arrested files with the help of the free tools provided by anti-malware experts. Sometimes the hackers mistakenly send the decryption key to the wronged in the ransom readme. Such an epic fail allows the injured part to restore the files. But naturally, one should never expect such a chance. Make no mistake, ransomware is a tamperersâ instrument to lay their hands on the money of their victims.
How to avoid ransomware attack?
Frendi ransomware doesnât have a endless power, so as any similar malware.
You can defend your PC from its infiltration in several easy steps:
- Never open any emails from unknown mailers with unknown addresses, or with content that has nothing to do with something you are waiting for (can you win in a lottery without participating in it?). If the email subject is more or less something you are waiting for, scrutinize all elements of the dubious letter with caution. A hoax letter will surely have a mistake.
- Never use cracked or untrusted software. Trojans are often distributed as a part of cracked software, possibly as a âpatchâ to prevent the license check. Understandably, dubious programs are difficult to distinguish from reliable software, as trojans sometimes have the functionality you need. Try to find information about this software product on the anti-malware forums, but the optimal way is not to use such programs at all.
Reasons why I would recommend GridinSoft3
Download Removal Tool.
Run the setup file.
Press âInstallâ button.
Once installed, Anti-Malware will automatically run.
Wait for the Anti-Malware scan to complete.
Click on âClean Nowâ.
FAQ
đ€ Is it possible to open â.Frendiâ files?
Unfortunately, no. You need to decipher the â.Frendiâ files first. Then you will be able to open them.
đ€ The encrypted files are very important to me. How can I decrypt them quickly?
If the â.Frendiâ files contain some really important information, then you probably have them backed up. Otherwise, you might try to employ System Restore. The only question is whether you have saved any Restore Points that would be helpful now. The rest of the methods require patience.
đ€ What should I do if the Frendi ransomware has blocked my computer and I canât get the activation key.
đ€ 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 by email, you could still download them from your online mail server.
- You may have shared images or videos with your friends or relatives. Just ask them to post those pictures back to you.
- If you have initially downloaded any of your files from the Web, you can try doing it again.
- Your messengers, social networks pages, and cloud drives might have all those files too.
- Maybe you still have the needed files on your old PC, a notebook, mobile, external storage, etc.
HINT: You can employ data recovery programs5 to get your lost data back since ransomware encodes the copies of your files, deleting the authentic ones. In the video below, you can see how to recover your files with PhotoRec, but be advised: you wonât be able to do it before you remove the ransomware itself with an antivirus program.
Also, you can contact the following official 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 sĂ©curitĂ© des systĂšmes dâinformation;
- In Germany: Bundesamt fĂŒr Sicherheit in der Informationstechnik;
- In Ireland: An Garda SĂochĂĄna;
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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