Ransomware viruses are rightfully seen as the most dangerous and treacherous cyber threats you’re likely to ever encounter online. (our instruction manual at the bottom of the article may help you with removing the ransomware) These malicious programs have been known to infiltrate their victims’ computers, encrypt some of the most vital files on them and then proceed to blackmail the users for money and one of the latest variants of this malware is called Lukitus Ransomware. That’s also most likely the reason you have ended up on this page, because you too have fallen prey to this evil criminal scheme. As a result, you have probably lost access to some of your most important data and now feel helpless about doing anything to regain it. Well, we’re going to be honest with you and say that the reason why ransomware is considered as harmful as it is, is because of the difficulty of dealing with its aftermath. Oftentimes the encryption processes prove to be so complex that recovery may not always be a possibility. Nevertheless, we are more than happy to provide Lukitus Ransomware victims with a detailed removal guide to help by the very least remove the virus. But that alone won’t be enough to recover the data and additional measures will be necessary. To find out more on that and ransomware in general, please continue reading the information presented herein.
How To Remove Lukitus Ransomware Virus Guide
Step 1 – hunt for active virus processes
To do this, you will have to make use of your Task Manager. Use the R-Ctrl+Shift+Esc key combination in order to open it. Now, go to the Processes tab and sort the list by order of CPU and/or memory used. Now, look through the list – if any process is using up very high amounts of memory or has a suspicious name or description, then it might be a process ran by the Ransomware. End that process immediately and move on to the next step.
Now open your start menu and search for MSConfig. Go to the Startup section and see if there are any suspicious entries with unknown manufacturers. Disable anything that seems illegitimate. Keep in mind that the virus may duplicate the names of real programs!
Step 2 – prepare your PC for the removal process
Next thing you need to do is boot your machine into Safe Mode and reveal all hidden files and folders. Click on the links for detailed instructions.
Step 3 – find and delete virus-related files
- Open your Registry Editor by typing regedit in the Run window (Winkey+R) and pressing Enter, then open Edit->Find. Search for the virus name.
- If there are any results, delete those registry entries.
- Open your Start Menu and in the search field type each of the following and go to the corresponding location:
- %AppData%
- %LocalAppData%
- %ProgramData%
- %WinDir%
- %Temp%
- Delete everything from Temp. In the other folders, see if there has been added anything recently that seems suspicious. If that is the case, delete the new entries.
Step 4 – look for Hosts file manipulation
- Use the Win-key+R combination to open Run and hit enter after you copy-paste the following:
notepad %windir%/system32/Drivers/etc/hosts
- A notepad file will open. If your PC has been infected, may be IP addresses at the bottom of the file. Delete them.
- Note that if those IP’s are either 0.0.0.0 or 127.0.0.1, then they are not coming from a virus, thus this is no indication of an infection.
Step 5 – decrypt already encrypted files
For this, you will first have to identify the virus you are dealing with and then acquire the corresponding decryptor tool that can help you decrypt your files.
- To identify the Ransomware, go to this link and follow the instructions.
- Now that you know what you are dealing it, make a search for how to decrypt ransomware and look for a decryptor for your specific virus.