Murk Files (Murk Ransomware) — How to Remove Virus?

What is known about the Murk virus?

The renaming will be executed by this scheme: [victim’s_ID].[email_address].MURK. In the course of encryption, a file entitled, for instance, “report.docx” will be altered to “report.docx.id[9ECFA84E-3308].[].MURK”.

In each directory containing the encoded files, a info.txt file will appear. It is a ransom money note. Therein you can find information about the ways of contacting the racketeers and some other remarks. The ransom note usually contains instructions on how to buy the decryption tool from the ransomware developers. You can obtain this decoding tool after contacting via email. That is it.

The info.txt document accompanying the Murk ransomware states the following:

All your files have been encrypted!
All your files have been encrypted due to a security problem with your PC. If you want to restore them, write us to the e-mail 
Write this ID in the title of your message -
In case of no answer in 24 hours write us to this e-mail:
You have to pay for decryption in Bitcoins. The price depends on how fast you write to us. After payment we will send you the tool that will decrypt all your files.
Free decryption as guarantee
Before paying you can send us up to 5 files for free decryption. The total size of files must be less than 4Mb (non archived), and files should not contain valuable information. (databases,backups, large excel sheets, etc.)
How to obtain Bitcoins
The easiest way to buy bitcoins is LocalBitcoins site. You have to register, click \'Buy bitcoins\', and select the seller by payment method and price.
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Also you can find other places to buy Bitcoins and beginners guide here:
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Attention!
Do not rename encrypted files.
Do not try to decrypt your data using third party software, it may cause permanent data loss.
Decryption of your files with the help of third parties may cause increased price (they add their fee to our) or you can become a victim of a scam.

In the picture below, you can see what a folder with files encrypted by the Murk looks like. Each filename has the “.[victim\’s_ID].[email_address].MURK” extension appended to it.

How did my computer get infected with Murk ransomware?

There are currently three most popular ways for evil-doers to have the Murk virus settled in your digital environment. These are email spam, Trojan infiltration and peer-to-peer networks.

If you access your inbox and see emails that look just like notifications from utility services companies, delivery agencies like FedEx, web-access providers, and whatnot, but whose sender is strange to you, beware of opening those emails. They are very likely to have a ransomware file enclosed in them. Thus it is even more dangerous to open any attachments that come with emails like these.

Another thing the hackers might try is a Trojan virus model³. A Trojan is a program that infiltrates into your machine pretending to be something legal. For instance, you download an installer of some program you need or an update for some program. But what is unboxed turns out to be a harmful program that encrypts your data. Since the installation file can have any name and any icon, you have to make sure that you can trust the source of the files you’re downloading. The optimal way is to use the software companies’ official websites.

As for the peer networks like torrents or eMule, the danger is that they are even more trust-based than the rest of the Web. You can never know what you download until you get it. So you’d better be using trustworthy websites. Also, it is a good idea to scan the directory containing the downloaded objects with the antivirus as soon as the downloading is complete.