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from the we-control-the-horizontal,-we-control-the-vertical dept.
It took a year from proof of concept to in-the-wild attack, but ransomware for Android-based smart TVs is now here. As one victim discovered this Christmas, figuring out how to clean such an infection can be quite difficult.
Ransomware for Android phones has already been around for several years and security experts have warned in the past that it's only a matter of time until such malicious programs start affecting smart TVs, especially since some of them also run Android.
[...] Kansas-based software developer Darren Cauthon reported on Twitter on Dec. 25 that a family member accidentally infected his Android-based TV with ransomware after downloading a movie-watching app. The picture shared by Cauthon showed the TV screen with an FBI-themed ransom message.
[...] Eventually LG provided Cauthon with a solution that involved pressing and releasing two physical buttons on the TV in a particular order. This booted the TV, which runs the now defunct Android-based Google TV platform, into a recovery mode.
The Register also has additional details on the recovery method:
With the TV powered off, place one finger on the settings symbol then another finger on the channel down symbol. Remove finger from settings, then from channel down, and navigate using volume keys to the wipe data/ factory reset option. ®
-- submitted from IRC
(Score: 1) by gmrath on Thursday January 05 2017, @03:10AM
I remember Dad in the back of one of those tube TVs when it crapped out with a screw driver, shorting out this and that, resulting in loud, satisfying cracks. When all was safe, we removed the tubes, packed them in a cigar box, and headed to the nearest drug store to test them on the tube tester. I remember tubes named 12AU6 and like mixes of numbers and letters; only later did I learn they specified tube type, power supply voltages and other properties, all rolled up in those codes. We usually got the TV going again after replacing the failed tube(s), sometimes after two or more trips to the drug store tube tester. I also remember rare occasions when not everything was shorted to ground long enough to bleed off the charge. Dad was not a profane man, almost never swearing, but I learned a new word or two when he discovered a charged cap the hard way. I'm sure Dad didn't think of TV repairs after coming home from work as "good times" but, as a 10-year-old, I was fascinated by that kind of stuff, and I did. Now, to repair TVs and the like it's cheaper to just pitch it and buy a new one.