How To Remove .Clown file virus And Recover Infected Data

Simple Steps To Delete .Clown file virus From Computer

.Clown file virus is a kind of highly dangerous malware infection that belongs to the category of ransomware. Similar to other notorious threats of same kind, it also first enters the targeted computers secretly without users’ approval and then encrypts their crucial files and data stored inside their systems until the victims pay the attackers a sum of ransom to unlock it. This dangerous crypto-malware uses a very powerful encryption algorithm to lock your essential files such as images, videos, music, documents, PDFs etc. and makes them completely inaccessible. You can easily determine the infected files as this hazardous ransomware appends “.clown” extension with the name of each of them.

After completing the encryption process, .Clown file virus leaves couple of ransom notes “!!! READ THIS !!!.hta” and “HOW TO RECOVER ENCRYPTED FILES.txt” on the desktop and informs your about the unpleasant situation. It also provides the file-recovery instruction stating that in order to get back access to the locked files again, you need to contact the attackers via the email address provided. Crooks state that, to regain access to the locked data, you must buy the decryption tool from them. They also ask you to establish the contact with them immediately otherwise the required software will be deleted from the server.

Text Presented in The “!!! READ THIS !!!.hta” File:

All your files have been encrypted!
Your documents, photos, databases and other important files have been encrypted with strongest encryption. you can return all your files if you want to restore files, write us to the e-mail: [email protected]
Write this ID in the subject e-mail:1E857D00
It is in your interest to respond as soon as possible to ensure the restoration of your files, because we wont keep your decryption keys at our server more than one week. The price depends on how fast you write to us.
Free decryption as guarantee
Before paying you can send us up to 1 file for free decryption. The total size of files must be less than 1Mb (non archived), and files should not contain valuable information. (databases,backups, large excel sheets, etc.)
How to obtain Bitcoins
You can buy bitcoin from here:
hxxps:localbitcoins.com/buy_bitcoins
Also you can find other places to buy Bitcoins and beginners guide here:
hxxp:www.coindesk.com/information/how-can-i-buy-bitcoins/
Attention!
Do not rename encrypted files.
Using another tools could corrupt your files, in case of using third party software we don’t give guarantees that full recovery is possible so use it on your own risk.

Text Presented in The “HOW TO RECOVER ENCRYPTED FILES.txt” File:

Clown ransomware

Your unique ID:”1E857D00″

All personal files on your computer are encrypted!
Don’t worry, you can restore all your files.
Without the original key recovery is impossible.
If you want to decrypt your files, you have to pay in Bitcoin.
The price depends on how fast you write to us.
If you want to restore files, write us to the e-mail: “[email protected]”
It is in your interest to respond as soon as possible to ensure the restoration of your files,
because we won’t keep your decryption keys at our server more than one week because of our security.

Free decryption as guarantee:
Before paying to send us up to 1 file for free decryption. The total size of the file must be less
than 1Mb (the file should not be important to you).

You can buy bitcoin from here:
hxxps://localbitcoins.net/buy_bitcoins
hxxps://libertyx.com/
hxxps://www.coinmama.com/buy
You can find other places to buy Bitcoins and beginners guide here:
hxxps://www.coindesk.com/information/how-can-i-buy-bitcoins

CAUTION!
1-Using other tools could corrupt your files, in case of using third party software we don’t give
guarantees that full recovery is possible.
2-Please do not change the name of files or file extension if your files are important to you!

Should You Deal With The Attackers?

.Clown file virus authors often ask you to pay a sum of ransom money to them but the ransom amount depends on how quickly you contact them. However, it might be in the range of $200 to $1500 that has to be paid in BitCoins. Whatever the circumstance might be, you should not make any sort of payment to the attackers as you have absolutely no guarantee that they will decrypt your files even after taking the ransom. According to the reports, such types of criminals normally ignore the victims once the payment is done and cause them to lose both files as well as money.

What Should The Victims Do?

Paying ransom to the crooks is not a clever thing to do under any circumstance as it will only motivate them to do more such attacks for further revenues. The first thing you need to do here is to delete .Clown file virus from the work-station as early as possible and then find any alternate way to recover the compromised data. For this, you can use a genuine data-recovery application. There are multiple third-party programs that are very useful in restoring the infected or lost files, you should also use any of such tools to get your data back.

Threat Summary

Name- .Clown file virus

Type- Ransomware, Crypto-virus

Description- Deadly crypto-malware that encrypt users’ crucial files and then ask them to pay off for the decryption key.

Extension- “.clown”

Ransom note- “!!! READ THIS !!!.hta” and “HOW TO RECOVER ENCRYPTED FILES.txt”

Attackers’ Contact- [email protected]

Symptoms- All of your important files and data are locked and can’t be opened without using a private key.

Distribution-Spam email campaigns, Executable files etc.

Damage- Causes permanent data loss and can also drop other pernicious infections onto the compromised device.

Removal- Manual and automatic guidelines as provided under this article

How Does This Crypto-virus Enter Your System:

Opening spam email attachments, playing Online games, using infected removal devices, sharing peer to peer network, watching adult movies etc. are major reasons behind its infiltration into the Windows PCs. And hence, you need to be very careful while browsing the web and stay away from these vicious sources to keep the machine harmless and secured. Ignore suspicious emails coming from unknown source. They might include malicious attachment which automatically get triggered and lead to the malware intrusion once you click on it. In case you are among those users who are already suffering from the attack of this malware, you must remove .Clown file virus from the computer immediately.

Antimalware Details And User Guide

Click Here For Windows

Click Here For Mac

Step 1: Remove .Clown file virus through “Safe Mode with Networking”

Step 2: Delete .Clown file virus using “System Restore”

Step 1: Remove .Clown file virus through “Safe Mode with Networking”

For Windows XP and Windows 7 users: Boot the PC in “Safe Mode”. Click on “Start” option and continuously press on F8 during the start process until the “Windows Advanced Option” menu appears on the screen. Choose “Safe Mode with Networking” from the list.

Now, a windows homescreen appears on the desktop and work-station is now working on “Safe mode with networking”.

For Windows 8 Users: Go to the “Start Screen”. In the search results select settings, type “Advanced”. In the “General PC Settings” option, choose “Advanced startup” option. Again, click on the “Restart Now” option. The work-station boots to “Advanced Startup Option Menu”. Press on “Troubleshoot” and then “Advanced options” button.  In the “Advanced Option Screen”, press on “Startup Settings”. Again, click on “Restart” button. The work-station will now restart in to the “Startup Setting” screen. Next is to press F5 to boot in Safe Mode in Networking.

For Windows 10 Users: Press on Windows logo and on the “Power” icon. In the newly opened menu, choose “Restart” while continuously holding “Shift” button on the keyboard. In the new open “Choose an option” window, click on “Troubleshoot” and then on the “Advanced Options”. Select “Startup Settings” and press on “Restart”. In the next window, click on “F5” button on the key-board.

Step 2: Delete .Clown file virus using “System Restore”

Log-in to the account infected with .Clown file virus. Open the browser and download a legitimate anti-malware tool. Do a full System scanning. Remove all the malicious detected entries.

In case if you cannot start the PC in “Safe Mode with Networking”, Try using “System Restore”

• During the “Startup”, continuously press on F8 key until the “Advanced Option” menu appears. From the list, choose “Safe Mode with Command Prompt” and then press “Enter”

• In the new opened command prompt, enter “cd restore” and then press “Enter”.

• Type: rstrui.exe and Press “ENTER”

• Click “Next” on the new windows

• Choose any of the “Restore Points” and click on “Next”. (This step will restore the work-station to its earlier time and date prior to .Clown file virus infiltration in the PC.

• In the newly opened windows, press on “Yes”.

Once your PC gets restored to its previous date and time, download the recommended anti-malware tool and perform a deep scanning in order to remove .Clown file virus files if they left in the work-station.

In order to restore the each (separate) file by this ransomware, use “Windows Previous Version” feature. This method is effective when “System Restore Function” is enabled in the work-station.

Important Note: Some variants of .Clown file virus delete the “Shadow Volume Copies” as well hence this feature may not work all the time and is applicable for selective computers only.

How to Restore Individual Encrypted File:

In order to restore a single file, right click on it and go to “Properties”. Select “Previous Version” tab. Select a “Restore Point” and click on “Restore” option.

In order to access the files encrypted by .Clown file virus, you can also try using “Shadow Explorer”. In order to get more information on this application, press here.

Important: Data Encryption Ransomware are highly dangerous and it is always better that you take precautions to avoid its attack on your work-station. It is advised to use a powerful anti-malware tool in order to get protection in real-time. With this help of “SpyHunter”, “group policy objects” are implanted in the registries in order to block harmful infections like .Clown file virus.

Also, In Windows 10, you get a very unique feature called “Fall Creators Update” that offer “Controlled Folder Access” feature in order to block any kind of encryption to the files. With the help of this feature, any files stored in the locations such as “Documents”, “Pictures”, “Music”, “Videos”, “Favorites” and “Desktop” folders are safe by default.

It is very important that you install this “Windows 10 Fall Creators Update” in your PC to protect your important files and data from ransomware encryption. The more information on how to get this update and add an additional protection form rnasomware attack has been discussed here.

How to Recover the Files Encrypted by .Clown file virus?

Till now, you would have understood that what had happed to your personal files that got encrypted and how you can remove the scripts and payloads associated with .Clown file virus in order to protect your personal files that has not been damaged or encrypted until now. In order to retrieve the locked files, the depth information related to “System Restore” and “Shadow Volume Copies” has already been discussed earlier. However, in case if you are still unable to access the encrypted files then you can try using a data recovery tool.

Use of Data Recovery Tool

This step is for all those victims who have already tries all the above mentioned process but didn’t find any solution. Also it is important that you are able to access the PC and can install any software. The data recovery tool works on the basis of System scanning and recovery algorithm. It searches the System partitions in order to locate the original files which were deleted, corrupted or damaged by the malware. Remember that you must not re-install the Windows OS otherwise the “previous” copies will get deleted permanently. You have to clean the work-station at first and remove .Clown file virus infection. Leave the locked files as it is and follow the steps mentioned below.

Step1: Download the software in the work-station by clicking on the “Download” button below.

Step2: Execute the installer by clicking on downloaded files.

Step3: A license agreement page appears on the screen. Click on “Accept” to agree with its terms and use. Follow the on-screen instruction as mentioned and click on “Finish” button.

Step4: Once the installation gets completed, the program gets executed automatically. In the newly opened interface, select the file types that you want to recover and click on “Next”.

Step5: You can select the “Drives” on which you want the software to run and execute the recovery process. Next is to click on the “Scan” button.

Step6: Based on drive you select for scanning, the restore process begins. The whole process may take time depending on the volume of the selected drive and number of files. Once the process gets completed, a data explorer appears on the screen with preview of that data that is to be recovered. Select the files that you want to restore.

Step7. Next is to locate the location where you want to saver the recovered files.