Wizoz Ransomware - How to remove

Wizoz is a dangerous program that is used by cybercriminals to extort people for money. Wizoz attacks Windows PCs and encrypts data, making it unusable. You can tell a Wizoz infection because the encrypted files have “[email protected]” and “WIZOZ” added to their names.

One way to reverse Wizoz’s encryption is to pay money to the hackers, but that’s not guaranteed to work, the extortionists are known for cheating their victims.

About Wizoz:

Threat type	Ransomware.
Wizoz infection symptoms	Files don’t open, their icons look different, their names are changed to end with “WIZOZ”, Task Manager doesn’t work, ransom notes are placed in some folders.
Can you recover your data?	Paying the ransom is risky, there’s no free decryption option, there are some ways to recover some lots data.
How to delete Wizoz ransomware	Check your device for malware using antivirus scanners (Spyhunter, Malwarebytes, etc.), protect your PC from being attacked again.

How Wizoz ransomware works

Wizoz ransomware is a variant of VoidCrypt ransomware, just like Grandeur and others.

It infects computers via RDP, malicious emails, and others means. It encrypts documents, spreadsheets, pictures, and other files, then asks for money to decrypt them.

Encrypted files can’t be opened. They’re basically broken. The only way to fix them is to use a decryption program with a unique decryption password, but the only ones who know the passwords are the people who operate Wizoz. So, the encrypted files are being held for ransom.

Wizoz marks the encrypted files by changing their names – adding the suffix “[email][id].WIZOZ”, like this:

document.docx.[[email protected]].[JD-57F75HN320DY].WIZOZ

Wizoz ransomware also creates a ransom note in which it asks the victim to contact the extortionists to set up payments:

All Your Files Has Been Encrypted

You Have to Pay to Get Your Files Back

1-Go to C:\ProgramData] folder  and send us prvkey*.txt.key  file , * might be a number (like this : prvkey3.txt.key)

2-You can send some file little than 1mb for Decryption test to trust us But the test File should not contain valuable data

3-Payment should be with Bitcoin

4-Changing Windows without saving prvkey.txt.key file will cause permanete Data loss

Our Email:[email protected]

in Case of no Answer:[email protected]

Can you get your data back?

The best way to restore your data is from a backup, but not everyone can do that. To make things more difficult, Wizoz deletes backups that it finds on the infected computer. There are a few ways to recover lost data, including file recovery and repair.

At the time, there’s no way to decrypt the files that Wizoz encrypted without paying the ransom. Be careful of scammers promising to fix your files in exchange for money. Only the extortionists behind Wizoz have the decryption keys necessary to reverse the encryption done by the ransomware.

You could contact the extortionists behind Wizoz and pay the ransom, but some victims say that they were scammed by these criminals:

• asked to pay again and again,
• had no decryption key sent to them,
• if they did get decryption working, they still couldn’t recover some of the locked data.

Like with other ransomware, paying the ransom does not guarantee file recovery.

How to delete Wizoz ransomware

Although Wizoz should delete itself, it’s best to make sure that it’s gone. It’s also important to check if any other malicious programs might have infected your PC alongside this ransomware.

You can do that by scanning your PC with an antivirus program, such as Spyhunter, Malwarebytes, and others.

Antivirus programs stop Wizoz from infecting PCs, but that’s not always possible because of all the tricks that malicious actors use to get around security software. Still, if antivirus scanners get to scan Wizoz, they flag it as malicious and give it various labels: Malicious, AmnesiaE, Ouroboros, Trojan, Ransom, Filecoder, Voidcrypt, etc.

Other threats, such as spyware infections, are detected by different names.

It’s also important to find out how Wizoz infected your computer and stop it from happening again. For example, if malicious actors hacked your RDP, it’s important to use stronger credentials and 2FA to stop unauthorized access.

Automatic Malware removal tools

How to recover Wizoz Ransomware 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 Wizoz Ransomware has infiltrated to your system and then click “Next”.
• To start System restore click “Yes”.

 

Step 2. Complete removal of Wizoz Ransomware

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 Wizoz Ransomware. You can check other tools here.  

Step 3. Restore Wizoz Ransomware 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 Wizoz Ransomware 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 Wizoz Ransomware 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.