PadCrypt - How to remove

PadCrypt is a dangerous virus that might infect personal computers. It is listed as a ransomware, so once installed it will lock some of your personal files and demand for a ransom to unlock them.

If you have noticed this virus on your computer – don’t panic and proceed reading this article. We will provide you with detailed instructions how you should act in this particular situation.

First thing you have to do when your computer gets infected with ransomware like this is to remove the virus itself. This won’t unlock your files, but it will assure that no more files will be encrypted and no additional malware will be added to your system. So, in order to eliminate PadCrypt, download trustworthy anti-malware application and scan your computer. We suggest to use either Spyhunter or Malwarebytes – both of these applications should easily deal with this task. Please notice that it’s not enough to have anti-virus application installed on your computer and only reliable anti-malware application can help you to protect your system from viruses like PadCrypt.

However, if you feel like downloading anti-malware software is not a good idea, you can remove PadCrypt from your computer manually as well. This process might be complicated, so we have developed a step-by-step PadCrypt manual removal guide – scroll down below this article and take a look at it. Try to complete all steps correctly and you will be able to remove PadCrypt manually by your own.

To learn more about specific features of PadCrypt ransomware – keep reading this article. If you have some questions regarding this topic, feel free to ask them in the comments section below and we will do our best to answer them all.

About PadCrypt ransomware

Once inside on your system, PadCrypt will run a scan to find files it could encrypt. This ransomware targets all most common file types, such as .mp3, .doc, .txt, and so on. Once the scan is over, all files stored on your hard drive that match the criteria of this ransomware will be locked. Then you will see a message on your desktop.

The message displayed by PadCrypt says:

Your Files and documents have been encrypted!

What happened to my files?
Your photos, documents, and videos on this computer have been encrypted with AES-256. To get your files back you will need to purchase your encryption key within the set date, failing to pay will result in the destruction of your key.

How do I obtain my new key?
The key produced for your computer is stored on our server. To obtain the unique key for your computer, which will decrypt and recover your encrypted files, you will need to pay a fee in Bitcoin/Ukash/PSC prior to the key destroy date. After that your key will be destroyed and nobody will ever be able to recover your files

As you can see, PadCrypt is asking you to pay money in order to retrieve your files. They even set a backwards clock to force users to do it right now. We don’t recommend to pay the ransom because there are no guarantees that you will retrieve your files even after paying the money they are asking for.

Unfortunately, as for now, there are no decryption software for this ransomware, so the only way to get back your files is to restore them from a disk copy. Here’s a detailed tutorial how to do that: https://www.2-viruses.com/how-to-do-a-system-restore.

Update. In November, 2016, it was detected that PadCrypt 3.0 is spread via fake Visa Credit Card generator.

Update of the 3rd of December, 2016. PadCrypt updated to version 3.1.2, however, no significant changes made.

Update of the 20th of March, 2017. PadCrypt still does not give up. Its creators have now updated their virus and it is transmitted in a 3.4.1 version.

Update of the 27th of March, 2017. While just last week a version of PadCrypt was detected, today we became informed of a more recent sample: 3.4.4. The distribution of PadCrypt appears to be very low even though new versions are being created.

How to recover PadCrypt encrypted files and remove the virus

Step 1. Restore system into last known good state using system restore

1. Reboot your computer to Safe Mode with Command Prompt:

for Windows 7 / Vista/ XP

• Start → Shutdown → Restart → OK.
• Press F8 key repeatedly until Advanced Boot Options window appears.
• Choose Safe Mode with Command Prompt.

for Windows 8 / 10

• Press Power at Windows login screen. Then press and hold Shift key and click Restart.
• Choose Troubleshoot → Advanced Options → Startup Settings and click Restart.
• When it loads, select Enable Safe Mode with Command Prompt from the list of Startup Settings.

 

2.Restore System files and settings.

• When Command Prompt mode loads, enter cd restore and press Enter.
• Then enter rstrui.exe and press Enter again.
• Click “Next” in the windows that appeared.
• Select one of the Restore Points that are available before PadCrypt has infiltrated to your system and then click “Next”.
• To start System restore click “Yes”.

 

Step 2. Complete removal of PadCrypt

After restoring your system, it is recommended to scan your computer with an anti-malware program, like Spyhunter and remove all malicious files related to PadCrypt. You can check other tools here.  

Step 3. Restore PadCrypt affected files using Shadow Volume Copies

If you do not use System Restore option on your operating system, there is a chance to use shadow copy snapshots. They store copies of your files that point of time when the system restore snapshot was created. Usually PadCrypt tries to delete all possible Shadow Volume Copies, so this methods may not work on all computers. However, it may fail to do so. Shadow Volume Copies are only available with Windows XP Service Pack 2, Windows Vista, Windows 7, and Windows 8. There are two ways to retrieve your files via Shadow Volume Copy. You can do it using native Windows Previous Versions or via Shadow Explorer. a) Native Windows Previous Versions Right-click on an encrypted file and select Properties → Previous versions tab. Now you will see all available copies of that particular file and the time when it was stored in a Shadow Volume Copy. Choose the version of the file you want to retrieve and click Copy if you want to save it to some directory of your own, or Restore if you want to replace existing, encrypted file. If you want to see the content of file first, just click Open.

b) Shadow Explorer It is a program that can be found online for free. You can download either a full or a portable version of Shadow Explorer. Open the program. On the left top corner select the drive where the file you are looking for is a stored. You will see all folders on that drive. To retrieve a whole folder, right-click on it and select “Export”. Then choose where you want it to be stored.

Step 4. Use Data Recovery programs to recover PadCrypt encrypted files

There are several data recovery programs that might recover encrypted files as well. This does not work in all cases but you can try this:

• We suggest using another PC and connect the infected hard drive as slave. It is still possible to do this on infected PC though.
• Download a data recovery program.
• Install and scan for recently deleted files.

Note: In many cases it is impossible to restore data files affected by modern ransomware. Thus I recommend using decent cloud backup software as precaution. We recommend checking out Carbonite, BackBlaze, CrashPlan or Mozy Home.

Manual removal