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Protect Yourself From Abuse: How to Find and Remove Stalkerware on Your Phone and PC

August 19, 2021/in Mobile Security

What if your phone calls, texts, FaceTime sessions, and GPS locations were being logged without your consent? What if they were all being sent to a tech-savvy stalker—often a former romantic partner or an abusively controlling current partner—who had gotten malware onto your phones, tablets, and pcs, effectively bugging them? That’s the unsettling job of stalkerware, a type of commercially available software designed to spy on victims without being detected.

Stalkerware can operate stealthily, so you probably wouldn’t know if your devices had it installed. According to a 2020 report from cybersecurity company Kaspersky, a majority of people with stalkerware on their devices don’t even know that the type of software exists, meaning they can’t protect themselves from it. We’ll help you understand what stalkerware is, how to remove it from your devices, and how to make sure stalkers can’t install it on your devices again, once they are clean.

What Stalkerware Is and Why It’s Considered Abusive

Make no mistake, stalkerware is a form of abuse. According to the Coalition Against Stalkerware (CAS), this type of software “may facilitate intimate partner surveillance, harassment, abuse, stalking, and/or violence.” Stalkerware is often marketed as a way to spy on current or former romantic partners, but it can also be found packaged as parental control software or employee tracking solutions.

Stalkerware programs’ legal status is vague in most countries. In many places, the software itself can be distributed legally. Using stalkerware to monitor someone, however, may be a punishable offense. The people who create stalkerware usually mention this in the terms and conditions, stating that you must not use the software in a manner that is illegal in the country or territory in which you live.

Technology-enabled abuse isn’t limited to stalkerware. Abusers can use seemingly innocuous utilities and built-in parental control apps like the “Find My” and Screen Time functions on Apple devices to keep tabs on their partner’s whereabouts and activity. Google’s Family Link application can be similarly used and abused by stalkers to track survivors or limit the sites they can…

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Hackers Infect Cracked Games With Cypto-Mining Malware That’s Almost Impossible To Remove

June 28, 2021/in Computer Security

KEY POINTS

Hackers are reportedly using cracked games to infect computers
A new report revealed the details about the malware
The scheme has netted hackers over $2 million in Monero cryptocurrency

Hackers and other malicious actors are apparently building cryptomining malware into copies of AAA games to infect unsuspecting players’ computers and cause them a lot of trouble.

A recent report has warned gamers who are fond of downloading and installing cracked, pirated or “free games” on their PC. It turns out copies of major games like “Grand Theft Auto 5,” “NBA 2K19,” “Pro Evolution Soccer 2018,” “Far Cry 5” and “The Sims 4,” among others, are being offered for free. Unknown to gamers, these titles are infected with devastating malware that gives hackers access to their PC and personal details.

Antivirus firm Avast recently reported a new piece of coin-mining malware, dubbed Cracknosh, infected over 200,000 Windows PCs since 2018 and allowed scammers to net more than $2 million in Monero cryptocurrency. If users happen to download and install these infected games, their antivirus software could be turned off, Windows security updates could stop and their GPU could be hijacked and programmed to mine cryptocurrency.

A few simple steps will help Photo: Pexels

According to the report, the installed cracked games run just fine, seemingly suggesting that they are legit and there is nothing harmful in them. However, the most troubling part about the Cracknosh malware is that once it is installed, it can make itself impenetrable even from Windows updates and security software. This is possible because the malware uninstalls any present antivirus software such as Avast, F-Secure, Bitdefender, McAfee, Panda, Kaspersky or Norton.

It also tweaks the Registry and disables Windows security updates, Microsoft/Defender. That’s not all, though. The Cracknosh malware will then deploy the XMRig miner to hijack the cycles of the PC and enable it to mine Monero, exposing the computer to internet malware. Cracknosh will eventually slow down the infected computer, wear out its components and of course, increase the user’s electricity bill.

For users who want to know if their computers have been…

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