Displaying items by tag: Shamoon

Researchers at CyberArk Labs have discovered a new way of gaining access to the innards of Windows 10 64-bit systems that can bypass existing safeguards, including the kernel patch protection known as PatchGuard that Microsoft developed to improve system security.

New malware called Shamoon, a variant of the older DistTrack, has been found to erase all hard drives and mapped storage on networked Windows physical or virtual machines. It is so virulent that one it is in the network it is game over.

Recently appointed McAfee global CTO Mike Fey told the company's Focus 12 conference the Shamoon malware was really about destroying any evidence of intrusions: "all it does is wreck the device," he said, likening it to the scene in a movie where the bad guy pours petrol over the scene of a crime, walks away and flicks a match over his shoulder.