PewCrypt Ransomware Locks Users' Files and Won't Offer a Decryption Key Until - and Unless - PewDiePie's YouTube Channel Beats T-Series To Hit 100M Subscribers (zdnet.com)

The battle between PewDiePie, currently the most subscribed channel on YouTube, and T-Series, an Indian music label, continues to have strange repercussions. In recent months, as T-Series closes in on the gap to beat PewDiePie for the crown of the most subscribers on YouTube, alleged supporters of PewDiePie, in an unusual show of love, have hacked Chromecasts and printers to persuade victims to subscribe to PewDiePie's channel. Now ZDNet reports about a second strain of ransomware that is linked to PewDiePie. From the report: A second one appeared in January, and this was actually a fully functional ransomware strain. Called PewCrypt, this ransomware was coded in Java, and it encrypted users' files in the "proper" way, with a method of recovering files at a later date. The catch --you couldn't buy a decryption key, but instead, victims had to wait until PewDiePie gained over 100 million followers before being allowed to decrypt any of the encrypted files. At the time of writing, PewDiePie had around 90 million fans, meaning any victim would be in for a long wait before they could regain access to any of their files. Making matters worse, if T-Series got to 100 million subscribers before PewDiePie, then PewCrypt would delete the user's encryption key for good, leaving users without a way to recover their data.

While the ransomware was put together as a joke, sadly, it did infect a few users, ZDNet has learned. Its author eventually realized the world of trouble he'd get into if any of those victims filed complaints with authorities, and released the ransomware's source code on GitHub, along with a command-line-based decryption tool.

Comments

Re:Curiosity

[BringsApples]

At what point, if any, do we start holding PDP responsible for the actions of his fans?

Blame someone for the actions of others...? Should we blame Tide for the idiots that ate their Tide-pods?

No he did not

[SuperKendall]

I have seen on Twitter recently that PewDiePie is "alt-right", but as is usual with anything labeled "alt-right" that is Fake News.

What the hell have you seen that would make him alt-right? I don't watch his videos much but in the few I have seen there is zero political content of any kind. He does meme reviews for crying out loud!

I am pretty sure he has irked some people, these days anyone who is mad at you for anything simply labels you "alt-right". Don't propagate slander and lies.

P.S. if you don't realize the NZ shooter simply used his name to try as a kind of trolling, you've not been paying attention to what happened there.

Re:No he did not

[AbRASiON]

This poster is correct.

PDP, is quite harmless, but the media have it in for him since he's a nice big target and they hate steamers/ bloggers generally because they're eating the lunch of traditional gaming media.

PewDiePie encompass typical childish and nerds humour, taking the piss and messing around. There's very very little bad stuff here.

Man did the sjw types get a hard on for him and will not drop it. It's foolishness like this, when they're so blatantly wrong which actually weakens their cause as people start to question "if they're wrong about PDP, who else are they misrepresentating?"

Ultimately resulting in genuine bad actors getting less need criticism and or general distrust of the gaming and eventually, regular media.

Re:Into the gaschamber with PewDiePie.

[JustAnotherOldGuy]

He's a Youtube star who is famous for being an empty-headed asshole.

And by 'star', I mean a racist, talentless hack, similar to Kim Kardashian or Paris Hilton.

And by 'famous', I mean that some people within the dysfunctional 'community' known as Youtube recognize his name.

And by 'community', I mean a group of losers who clicked a button with his name by it.