Hi there,
We recently discovered that my aunt very likely has a CryptoWall virus, which, from what I understand, is one of the most vicious viruses out there. The virus was presumably contracted via an infected e-mail. Upon restarting the computer every time and arriving on the desktop, we see this instruction page stating something along the lines that corrupted files can never be restored unless paying some ransom of $500. Does this sound familiar? She said that she had been experiencing corrupted files for just over a month now (likely since late-April 2014).
The files typically affected are Word Perfect documents, as well as .jpg files. ALL of these are unreadable (encrypted) and are not supported by any alternative programs that we tried (Microsoft Word, or NotePad for .doc files, and Microsoft Paint, or Photo Viewer for image files).
I am not certain if related to the virus, but her computer was not automatically doing updates, and the anti-virus was not active. There were difficulties in activating both, but we found solutions to get them working. Windows 8.1 was one of the updates, but this did not resolve the overall issue.
I feel really bad, as she has such a large album of photograph files (not backed up), as well as WordPerfect documents. Would it be possible to restore/repair the affected files?
Any information would be greatly appreciated!
Thanks,
~Trav.~
We recently discovered that my aunt very likely has a CryptoWall virus, which, from what I understand, is one of the most vicious viruses out there. The virus was presumably contracted via an infected e-mail. Upon restarting the computer every time and arriving on the desktop, we see this instruction page stating something along the lines that corrupted files can never be restored unless paying some ransom of $500. Does this sound familiar? She said that she had been experiencing corrupted files for just over a month now (likely since late-April 2014).
The files typically affected are Word Perfect documents, as well as .jpg files. ALL of these are unreadable (encrypted) and are not supported by any alternative programs that we tried (Microsoft Word, or NotePad for .doc files, and Microsoft Paint, or Photo Viewer for image files).
I am not certain if related to the virus, but her computer was not automatically doing updates, and the anti-virus was not active. There were difficulties in activating both, but we found solutions to get them working. Windows 8.1 was one of the updates, but this did not resolve the overall issue.
I feel really bad, as she has such a large album of photograph files (not backed up), as well as WordPerfect documents. Would it be possible to restore/repair the affected files?
Any information would be greatly appreciated!
Thanks,
~Trav.~