Spiderman No Way Home Movie File Could Land You in Phishing Trap
While torrenting, crypto miners targeted fans of "Spider-Man: No Way Home."
Last week, Kaspersky cybersecurity researchers warned that fraudsters are using phishing websites based on the upcoming film "Spider-Man: No Way Home" to deceive customers and steal their bank information.
New Delhi, India: Fans of "Spider-Man: No Way Home" who are seeking to access the film via internet file transfer on websites should be aware of a critical warning. According to security firm ReasonLabs, users' crypto miners are luring users in with illegal versions of the next instalment in the famous Marvel series.
The Monero miners were discovered to be connected to Russian torrent versions of the new film by the ReasonLabs research team.
According to the business, the crypto-miner adds exclusions to Windows Defender, generates persistence, and starts a watchdog process to keep track of its operations.
As of this date, "the malware is not signed and written in .net, and as of this date, it is not present in ‘VirusTotal‘. The malware tries to stay away from examining eyes, by using ‘legitimate’ names for the files and processes that it creates," the company said in a statement.
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"We recommend taking extra caution when getting content of any kind from non-official sources — whether it’s a document in an email from an unknown sender, a cracked programme from a fishy installation portal, or a file from an illegal transfer," it advised.
Although this malware does not breach personal information (as most people fear when they think of a virus on their computer), the damage that a miner produces may be seen on the user's electricity bill.
"This is real money that they have to pay, given that the miner runs for long periods," said the researchers.
"Additionally, the damage can be felt on a user’s device as often miners require high CPU usage, which causes the computer to slow down drastically," it added.
ReasonLabs said it is currently investigating the miner's origins, but that it is continuously seeing miners used in mainstream programmes, files of interest, popular apps, current events, and other places.
"Spider-Man: No Way Home," starring Tom Holland, has shattered box office records in India, grossing Rs 79.14 crore in just three days of release.
They saw an increase in fraudster activity in the days leading up to the film's release and discovered multiple cases of phishing websites set up to steal viewers' financial information.
In other situations, individuals who tried to get an illegal copy of the movie ended up with dangerous and unwanted programmes, adware, and even Trojans installed.
