TeslaCrypt Ransomware Operation Shuts Down, Apologizes

In what may be one of the strangest mobile payments developments in some time, the ransomware organization known as TeslaCrypt has shut down its operations for good.

Perhaps one of the most specialist forms of ransomware around, it had a very specific target, and now it will be taking out said targets no longer.

Reports suggest that TeslaCrypt’s makers were actually “sorry” for what they’d done over the years, which is something of an unusual development in its own right.

The TeslaCrypt ransomware targeted video games, specifically, and then demanded ransom generally in the form of bitcoin to have the games unlocked.

TeslaCrypt publicly released its master decryption key, allowing anyone who’d been affected by TeslaCrypt ransomware to unlock their own systems without payment.

It’s unclear why TeslaCrypt’s makers just shut down like that, but shut down they did, and that makes a formerly active ransomware distributor a thing of the past.

Given that the FBI’s section chief Chris Stangl recently referred to ransomware as a “…prevalent, increasing threat”, it’s good news, and it should drive down the numbers of losses from ransomware, which in 2015 measured around $24.1 million.

2016 was looking to be just as bad a year for ransomware, with around $209 million so far brought in, putting it on track to clear $1 billion in 2016. This won’t shut down ransomware itself, of course, but it will take out one potential source of the stuff.

Good news, if odd, but also news that reminds us there’s a much wider problem out there than some may think.

The standard admonitions apply here, particularly a focus on security as far as files and the like go. Watching what’s downloaded, keeping up with antiviral measures and the like can be a big help, and there’s one other point that can be a great help when it comes to ransomware: store files in an offline location.

Having a second computer that’s never taken online can be the ultimate weapon against ransomware; a wholly offline file storage system that depends on what’s called “air gap” security can turn ransomware into a mild inconvenience instead of the potential disaster it once was.

Ransomware can destroy people’s lives, make sensitive materials unusable, and a host of other possibilities. With TeslaCrypt out of action, it’s good news for most everybody, but it’s far from the only threat.