The new Spider-Man movie has fans in a frenzy, with many looking for ways to watch it without going to the cinema. However, security researchers are warning users to be cautious when downloading Spider-Man: No Way Home from torrent sites, as they may be infected with crypto malware.
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Cybersecurity firm Reasonlabs warned on Thursday that crypto malware was found in a torrent download of Marvel's new blockbuster film, "Spider-Man: No Way Home."
Reasonlabs said that attackers are using current events and trends to attract as many victims as possible.
“In this case, we are dealing with someone who has placed a monero miner (crypto malware) in a torrent download of the new movie Spider-Man: No Way Home.“.
Spider-Man: No Way Home has already become the highest-grossing film of 2021. Notably, it is the first film released during the Covid-19 pandemic to surpass one billion dollars in worldwide box office receipts.
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Speaking about the crypto malware that could infect a user by downloading Spider-Man from a torrent site, Reasonlabs explained: “The file identifies itself as ‘spiderman_net_putidomoi.torrent.exe’, which translates from Russian to ‘spiderman_no_wayhome.torrent.exe’.” The company believes the file likely came from a Russian torrenting website.
According to the company: “This crypto mining malware adds exclusions to Windows Defender, creates persistence, and creates a watchdog process to maintain its activity.”
“The malware attempts to evade analysis by using ‘legitimate’ names for the files and processes it creates,” Reasonlabs described.
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The cybersecurity firm says a simple safeguard is to always check that the extension of the file you receive matches the extension of the file you are downloading. For example, a movie file should end with “.mp4” and not “.exe.” The firm added: “To make sure you are seeing the actual file extension, open a folder, go to “View” and select “File name extensions.” This will ensure you are seeing the full file type.” A full analysis of this malware can be found here.
Source: news.bitcoin.com
