EUROPART Email Virus

What is EUROPART Email Virus?

Similar to Microsoft Rights Management Email Virus, Offer Email Virus, and many others, "EUROPART Email Virus" is a spam email campaign used to proliferate a trojan-type virus called FormBook.

As usual, cyber criminals send thousands of deceptive email messages to trick users into opening attached files, however, these files stealthily infect the system with the FormBook virus.

The email presents the malicious attachment as an invoice (a new order for "parts"), however, as mentioned above, opening this file results in FormBook infiltration. Note that cyber criminals claim to be employees of a company called EUROPART, however, this is only a disguise. Criminals often hide behind names of legitimate companies and governmental agencies.

They do this to give the impression of legitimacy - it is much simpler to trick users into opening attachments when they are received from familiar names. FormBook is a high-risk trojan designed to record various personal information, including keystrokes, saved logins/passwords, web browsing activity, and so on.

Therefore, cyber criminals might gain access to personal accounts on social networks, banks, etc. Their only purpose is to generate revenue for the developers by abusing hacked accounts, thereby causing serious privacy issues and significant financial loss.

If you have recently opened "EUROPART Email Virus" campaign attachments, there is a high probability that your computer is infected. Therefore, we advise you to scan it with a reputable anti-virus/anti-spyware suite and eliminate all detected threats.

Threat Summary:

Name	EUROPART spam
Threat Type	Trojan, Password stealing virus, Banking malware, Spyware
Symptoms	Trojans are designed to stealthily infiltrate victim's computer and remain silent thus no particular symptoms are clearly visible on an infected machine.
Distribution methods	Infected email attachments, malicious online advertisements, social engineering, software cracks.
Damage	Stolen banking information, passwords, identity theft, victim's computer added to a botnet.
Malware Removal (Windows)	To eliminate possible malware infections, scan your computer with legitimate antivirus software. Our security researchers recommend using Combo Cleaner. ▼ Download Combo Cleaner To use full-featured product, you have to purchase a license for Combo Cleaner. 7 days free trial available. Combo Cleaner is owned and operated by Rcs Lt, the parent company of PCRisk.com read more.

Many trojan-type viruses share similarities with EUROPART Email Virus including, for example, Adwind, Emotet, and TrickBot. 

Note that many trojans are distributed using spam email campaigns and are also designed to record user-system information. In some cases, however, trojans also proliferate other high-risk viruses (e.g., ransomware). In summary, all of them pose a significant threat to your privacy and computer safety. Therefore, trojans must be eliminated immediately.

How did EUROPART Email Virus infect my computer?

"EUROPART Email Virus" distributes the attachment as an archive of files. As mentioned, developers present it as an invoice/new order, however, the compressed files are executables of the FormBook trojan. Therefore, users are tricked into opening malware.

This is quite unusual, since, in most cases, spam campaigns deliver Microsoft Office documents designed to execute commands that stealthily download and install malware. The FormBook trojan targets the Microsoft Windows Operating System only and, therefore, users of other platforms are safe.

How to avoid installation of malware?

Lack of knowledge and careless behavior are the main reasons for computer infections. The key to safety is caution. Therefore, pay close attention when browsing the Internet. We strongly recommend that you think twice before opening email attachments. If the file seems irrelevant or has been received from suspicious/unrecognizable email address, it should never be opened.

We also strongly recommend that you have a reputable anti-virus/anti-spyware suite installed and running. If you have already opened a "EUROPART Email Virus" attachment, we recommend running a scan with Combo Cleaner Antivirus for Windows to automatically eliminate infiltrated malware.

Text presented in the "EUROPART Email Virus" email message:

Subject: Fw:re:new order and invoice
Good Day, Please find attached conditional PO and new order, please confirm if you still have in stock. Looking forward your order confirmation.
Best Regards,
Marijana Savic EUROPART
Finance Executive
T 669277893

FormBook trojan process ("ZANon") in Windows Task Manager:

Instant automatic malware removal: Manual threat removal might be a lengthy and complicated process that requires advanced IT skills. Combo Cleaner is a professional automatic malware removal tool that is recommended to get rid of malware. Download it by clicking the button below:
▼ DOWNLOAD Combo Cleaner By downloading any software listed on this website you agree to our Privacy Policy and Terms of Use. To use full-featured product, you have to purchase a license for Combo Cleaner. 7 days free trial available. Combo Cleaner is owned and operated by Rcs Lt, the parent company of PCRisk.com read more.

Quick menu:

• What is EUROPART spam?
• Types of malicious emails.
• How to spot a malicious email?
• What to do if you fell for an email scam?

Types of malicious emails:

Phishing Emails

Most commonly, cybercriminals use deceptive emails to trick Internet users into giving away their sensitive private information, for example, login information for various online services, email accounts, or online banking information.

Such attacks are called phishing. In a phishing attack, cybercriminals usually send an email message with some popular service logo (for example, Microsoft, DHL, Amazon, Netflix), create urgency (wrong shipping address, expired password, etc.), and place a link which they hope their potential victims will click on.

After clicking the link presented in such email message, victims are redirected to a fake website that looks identical or extremely similar to the original one. Victims are then asked to enter their password, credit card details, or some other information that gets stolen by cybercriminals.

Emails with Malicious Attachments

Another popular attack vector is email spam with malicious attachments that infect users' computers with malware. Malicious attachments usually carry trojans that are capable of stealing passwords, banking information, and other sensitive information.

In such attacks, cybercriminals' main goal is to trick their potential victims into opening an infected email attachment. To achieve this goal, email messages usually talk about recently received invoices, faxes, or voice messages.

If a potential victim falls for the lure and opens the attachment, their computers get infected, and cybercriminals can collect a lot of sensitive information.

While it's a more complicated method to steal personal information (spam filters and antivirus programs usually detect such attempts), if successful, cybercriminals can get a much wider array of data and can collect information for a long period of time.

Sextortion Emails

This is a type of phishing. In this case, users receive an email claiming that a cybercriminal could access the webcam of the potential victim and has a video recording of one's masturbation.

To get rid of the video, victims are asked to pay a ransom (usually using Bitcoin or another cryptocurrency). Nevertheless, all of these claims are false - users who receive such emails should ignore and delete them.

How to spot a malicious email?

While cyber criminals try to make their lure emails look trustworthy, here are some things that you should look for when trying to spot a phishing email:

• Check the sender's ("from") email address: Hover your mouse over the "from" address and check if it's legitimate. For example, if you received an email from Microsoft, be sure to check if the email address is @microsoft.com and not something suspicious like @m1crosoft.com, @microsfot.com, @account-security-noreply.com, etc.
• Check for generic greetings: If the greeting in the email is "Dear user", "Dear @youremail.com", "Dear valued customer", this should raise suspiciousness. Most commonly, companies call you by your name. Lack of this information could signal a phishing attempt.
• Check the links in the email: Hover your mouse over the link presented in the email, if the link that appears seems suspicious, don't click it. For example, if you received an email from Microsoft and the link in the email shows that it will go to firebasestorage.googleapis.com/v0... you shouldn't trust it. It's best not to click any links in the emails but to visit the company website that sent you the email in the first place.
• Don't blindly trust email attachments: Most commonly, legitimate companies will ask you to log in to their website and to view any documents there; if you received an email with an attachment, it's a good idea to scan it with an antivirus application. Infected email attachments are a common attack vector used by cybercriminals.

To minimise the risk of opening phishing and malicious emails we recommend using Combo Cleaner Antivirus for Windows. 

Example of a spam email:

What to do if you fell for an email scam?

• If you clicked on a link in a phishing email and entered your password - be sure to change your password as soon as possible. Usually, cybercriminals collect stolen credentials and then sell them to other groups that use them for malicious purposes. If you change your password in a timely manner, there's a chance that criminals won't have enough time to do any damage.
• If you entered your credit card information - contact your bank as soon as possible and explain the situation. There's a good chance that you will need to cancel your compromised credit card and get a new one.
• If you see any signs of identity theft - you should immediately contact the Federal Trade Commission. This institution will collect information about your situation and create a personal recovery plan.
• If you opened a malicious attachment - your computer is probably infected, you should scan it with a reputable antivirus application. For this purpose, we recommend using Combo Cleaner Antivirus for Windows.
• Help other Internet users - report phishing emails to Anti-Phishing Working Group, FBI’s Internet Crime Complaint Center, National Fraud Information Center and U.S. Department of Justice.

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