{"id":55444,"date":"2016-12-05T15:37:16","date_gmt":"2016-12-05T15:37:16","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.pcmatic.com\/blog\/?p=55444"},"modified":"2016-12-08T19:52:26","modified_gmt":"2016-12-08T19:52:26","slug":"websites-hosting-fake-flash-player-updater-with-locky","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.pcmatic.com\/blog\/websites-hosting-fake-flash-player-updater-with-locky\/","title":{"rendered":"Websites Hosting Fake Flash Player Updater With Locky"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Reports have\u00a0emerged of compromised or scam websites hosting fake Flash Player updaters that include the notorious Locky ransomware. See how you can\u00a0stay safe and spot a fake updater.<\/p>\n<p><!--more--><\/p>\n<p>The latest report on this is a scam website that is hosting the fake flash updater claiming it is real. They are most likely trying to trick users into going to this site through phishing or other means, and upon arriving the malicious FlashPlayer.exe downloads onto your machine.<\/p>\n<p>Immediately your red flag should be raised if it wasn&#8217;t upon getting to the site. You should be very skeptical of a website that automatically throws a download into your computer that you didn&#8217;t request. After the download, upon executing the file that appears to be an updater you would actually be infected with the Locky ransomware and your files would be encrypted.<\/p>\n<h3>How You Can Stay Safe<\/h3>\n<p>If you&#8217;re a <a href=\"https:\/\/www.pcmatic.com\/supported\">PC Matic<\/a> user, this executable would be blocked as it would not be on our whitelist of known good applications. Additionally, <a href=\"https:\/\/www.pcmatic.com\/supported\">PC Matic<\/a> will update your vulnerable apps including Flash Player during a scan and clean. By using the scan and clean you are ensuring that the update is coming from a secure and safe source. You can always steer clear of these updater scams knowing that we handle your vulnerable apps\u00a0for you.<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Reports have\u00a0emerged of compromised or scam websites hosting fake Flash Player updaters that include the notorious Locky ransomware. See how you can\u00a0stay safe and spot a fake updater.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":58,"featured_media":55450,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"site-sidebar-layout":"default","site-content-layout":"","ast-site-content-layout":"default","site-content-style":"default","site-sidebar-style":"default","ast-global-header-display":"","ast-banner-title-visibility":"","ast-main-header-display":"","ast-hfb-above-header-display":"","ast-hfb-below-header-display":"","ast-hfb-mobile-header-display":"","site-post-title":"","ast-breadcrumbs-content":"","ast-featured-img":"","footer-sml-layout":"","theme-transparent-header-meta":"","adv-header-id-meta":"","stick-header-meta":"","header-above-stick-meta":"","header-main-stick-meta":"","header-below-stick-meta":"","astra-migrate-meta-layouts":"default","ast-page-background-enabled":"default","ast-page-background-meta":{"desktop":{"background-color":"","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"tablet":{"background-color":"","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"mobile":{"background-color":"","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""}},"ast-content-background-meta":{"desktop":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-5)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"tablet":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-5)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"mobile":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-5)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""}},"footnotes":""},"categories":[12],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-55444","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-the-pit-blog"],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v27.4 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/product\/yoast-seo-wordpress\/ -->\n<title>Websites Hosting Fake Flash Player Updater With Locky<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"Reports have emerged of scam websites hosting fake Flash Player updaters that include Locky ransomware. See how you can stay safe and spot a fake updater.\" \/>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.pcmatic.com\/blog\/websites-hosting-fake-flash-player-updater-with-locky\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Websites Hosting Fake Flash Player Updater With Locky\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"Reports have emerged of scam websites hosting fake Flash Player updaters that include Locky ransomware. See how you can stay safe and spot a fake updater.\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/www.pcmatic.com\/blog\/websites-hosting-fake-flash-player-updater-with-locky\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"PC Matic Blog\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:publisher\" content=\"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/pcmatic\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2016-12-05T15:37:16+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:modified_time\" content=\"2016-12-08T19:52:26+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:image\" content=\"https:\/\/www.pcmatic.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/flash-player-f.png\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:width\" content=\"600\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:height\" content=\"305\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:type\" content=\"image\/png\" \/>\n<meta name=\"author\" content=\"Devin Bergin\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:creator\" content=\"@pcmatic\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:site\" content=\"@pcmatic\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:label1\" content=\"Written by\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data1\" content=\"Devin Bergin\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:label2\" content=\"Est. reading time\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data2\" content=\"1 minute\" \/>\n<script type=\"application\/ld+json\" class=\"yoast-schema-graph\">{\"@context\":\"https:\\\/\\\/schema.org\",\"@graph\":[{\"@type\":\"Article\",\"@id\":\"https:\\\/\\\/www.pcmatic.com\\\/blog\\\/websites-hosting-fake-flash-player-updater-with-locky\\\/#article\",\"isPartOf\":{\"@id\":\"https:\\\/\\\/www.pcmatic.com\\\/blog\\\/websites-hosting-fake-flash-player-updater-with-locky\\\/\"},\"author\":{\"name\":\"Devin Bergin\",\"@id\":\"https:\\\/\\\/www.pcmatic.com\\\/blog\\\/#\\\/schema\\\/person\\\/e1a87aba65278d9cd1064ad1966895fe\"},\"headline\":\"Websites Hosting Fake Flash Player Updater With Locky\",\"datePublished\":\"2016-12-05T15:37:16+00:00\",\"dateModified\":\"2016-12-08T19:52:26+00:00\",\"mainEntityOfPage\":{\"@id\":\"https:\\\/\\\/www.pcmatic.com\\\/blog\\\/websites-hosting-fake-flash-player-updater-with-locky\\\/\"},\"wordCount\":236,\"commentCount\":0,\"publisher\":{\"@id\":\"https:\\\/\\\/www.pcmatic.com\\\/blog\\\/#organization\"},\"image\":{\"@id\":\"https:\\\/\\\/www.pcmatic.com\\\/blog\\\/websites-hosting-fake-flash-player-updater-with-locky\\\/#primaryimage\"},\"thumbnailUrl\":\"https:\\\/\\\/www.pcmatic.com\\\/blog\\\/wp-content\\\/uploads\\\/flash-player-f.png\",\"articleSection\":[\"The Pit Blog\"],\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"CommentAction\",\"name\":\"Comment\",\"target\":[\"https:\\\/\\\/www.pcmatic.com\\\/blog\\\/websites-hosting-fake-flash-player-updater-with-locky\\\/#respond\"]}]},{\"@type\":\"WebPage\",\"@id\":\"https:\\\/\\\/www.pcmatic.com\\\/blog\\\/websites-hosting-fake-flash-player-updater-with-locky\\\/\",\"url\":\"https:\\\/\\\/www.pcmatic.com\\\/blog\\\/websites-hosting-fake-flash-player-updater-with-locky\\\/\",\"name\":\"Websites Hosting Fake Flash Player Updater With Locky\",\"isPartOf\":{\"@id\":\"https:\\\/\\\/www.pcmatic.com\\\/blog\\\/#website\"},\"primaryImageOfPage\":{\"@id\":\"https:\\\/\\\/www.pcmatic.com\\\/blog\\\/websites-hosting-fake-flash-player-updater-with-locky\\\/#primaryimage\"},\"image\":{\"@id\":\"https:\\\/\\\/www.pcmatic.com\\\/blog\\\/websites-hosting-fake-flash-player-updater-with-locky\\\/#primaryimage\"},\"thumbnailUrl\":\"https:\\\/\\\/www.pcmatic.com\\\/blog\\\/wp-content\\\/uploads\\\/flash-player-f.png\",\"datePublished\":\"2016-12-05T15:37:16+00:00\",\"dateModified\":\"2016-12-08T19:52:26+00:00\",\"description\":\"Reports have emerged of scam websites hosting fake Flash Player updaters that include Locky ransomware. 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