14 DAY TRIAL // Remember the court notice spam run that has been making the rounds for the past few weeks? Experts warn that there’s a new variation of the campaign. Cybercriminals have started sending out malicious “urgent eviction notifications.”
The emails carry the subject line “Urgent eviction notification No2621,” and they purport to come from a court bailiff. They read something like this:
“Please be advised that you are obliged to vacate the living space you occupy until March 28, 2014, 11 a.m. If you do not vacate it in the specified terms, the court will have to assign the forcible eviction for April 26, 2014, 11 a.m. If nobody is home we will not be responsible for safe keeping of your belongings.
Besides, if you fail to comply with the requirements of the court bailiff you will be fined for up to 200 minimum wage amounts with a subsequent doubling of the penalty amount and can be made criminally or administratively liable. The details of the circumstances that caused the judicial decisionof eviction are attached herewith.”
Getting evicted from your home is no laughing matter, so many users might rush to open the attachment without giving it too much thought.
Conrad Longmore of Dynamoo’s Blog has analyzed the fake emails and found that the attachment, a file named “Copy_Of_The_Court_Statement_N1801.zip,” contains an executable called “Copy_of_the_court_statement_us_ 28_01_2014.”
The expert hasn’t managed to analyze the threat because the archive file in the email he has analyzed is corrupt. However, it’s likely that this problem will be addressed by cybercriminals, so users are advised to be careful in case they come across such emails.
If you’ve a victim, regularly scan your computer with an updated antivirus to make sure it’s not infected with malware.