HELP_DECRYPT Removal Guide

Do you know what HELP_DECRYPT is?

The center of attention of this article is oddly a set of ransomware-related files known as HELP_DECRYPT. These files come with the newest reincarnation of the Cryptowall ransomware. Cryptowall 3.0 is the latest version in this family of ransomware and it greatly differs from the 2.0 version that was released not so long ago. HELP_DECRYPT files are an indication that your computer was infected with the 3.0 version, because 2.0 did not feature them. In this article are going to provide a brief description of this infection.

Let us begin our analysis by talking a bit about how this program is distributed. Cryptowall and thus HELP_DECRYPT have been created a by group of cyber criminals that try to bully inexperienced Internet surfers and extract money from them. One most commonly used method to distribute ransomware is email spam. The cyber criminals set up a remote server that automatically sends fake emails that are disguised as legitimate notifications, invitations or inquiries from some kind of company. The emails may contain a link to a website that will download the ransomware, but in the case of Cryptowall, we have found that in its emails it is attached as a .zip archive file. You can also get this infection by visiting malicious websites that feature fake Java, Flash, and other updates. So this wraps up the origins section. Now let us discuss how this infection works.

Once your computer is infected with Cryptowall 3.0 it will spring into action and do the following: It will inject malicious code into the “Svchost.exe” process, which will initiate the ransomware functions. Once active, this ransomware will try to connect to a variety of IP addresses (eg. 195.29.106.157:4444) and make a POST request that contains the encoded request string. Once that is done, this ransomware will receive an ID, and then it will initiate the main Cryptowall Thread.HELP_DECRYPT Removal GuideHELP_DECRYPT screenshot
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This ransomware will scan your computer for files that usually contain personal information. It will look for XLS, DOC, PPT, PDF, CDR, and JPG, among others. Cryptowall 3.0 will encrypt those files using the RSA encryption algorithm. After it has encrypted the files, this ransomware will download HELP_DECRYPT files. For some reason it downloads not one but four files in the .txt, .html, .png, and .url formats. These files contain the same information which states that “All of your files were protected by a strong encryption with RSA-2048 using CryptoWall 3.0.” “Protected” is the wrong word choice here as it is plain to see that the reason for the encryption is to force you to pay a ransom for the decryption key which you might not get even when you pay up.

Your files may be lost forever, but there is no reason to pay $500 USD for the decryption key which you may not even receive. Therefore, you must first remove HELP_DECRYPT and Cryptowall using an anti-malware tool. Our researchers recommend using SpyHunter as it is capable of removing this ransomware in its entirety. You may find decryption software developed by third-parties online, but there are no guaranties that it will work.

In non-techie terms:

HELP_DECRYPT is part of the Cryptowall 3.0 ransomware program that was developed by cyber criminals to infect as many computers as possible using email spam. Once infected with this ransomware certain files on your computer will be encrypted and therefore unusable. The infection will leave four files named HELP_DECRYPT. You have to remove this infection as soon as you can. So please use our recommended software to do this.