Have your personal files been encrypted by the malicious ShellLocker Ransomware? You might not be able to tell this due to the notification that pops up on the screen whenever the encryption process is finished. This notification covers the entire screen, and you cannot minimize or close it. Furthermore, the malicious ransomware adds a malicious file to the Startup of your operating system, and that allows the notification to pop up even if you restart your computer. Luckily, you can assess the damage and delete ShellLocker Ransomware via Safe Mode (or Safe Mode with Networking). Before we discuss the removal of this threat – and that is definitely important – we want to introduce you to this malicious ransomware. Please take note of any questions that come up as you are reading this report. You can post these questions in the comments section below, and we will try to answer them as soon as possible.
If you reboot your operating system in Safe Mode, you will discover that ShellLocker Ransomware has taken your personal files hostage. The photos, documents, archives, videos, and other types of files with the “.L0cked” extension appended to them are the ones that the devious ransomware has corrupted. The cyber criminals behind this infection use a complex encryption algorithm to corrupt your files and render them unreadable. It is possible that your files could be restored with a decryption key, but – if it exists – it is in the hands of cyber criminals, and they want you to pay money for it. This is exactly what is requested of you via the intimidating ShellLocker Ransomware notification. The information presented by cyber criminals suggest that you should pay a ransom of 100 USD in 48 hours. Of course, the fine must be paid in Bitcoins to the 1Fpaccdfb16rgVnWPL2CGJkHH2VEmgxnor Bitcoin address. As you can see, cyber criminals do not provide you with another option, and, unfortunately, many victims choose to pay the ransom. The bad news is that no one knows if your files would be unlocked if you paid the ransom.
The malicious ShellLocker Ransomware blocks Task Manager, which is meant to stop you from disabling the scary screen-locking notification. As mentioned previously, you can overcome this hurdle by rebooting your PC in Safe Mode. Unfortunately, this move will not help you out with the decryption of your personal files. In fact, it is unlikely that you can recover your files at all. Legitimate decryptors are unable to assist you in this situation, and cyber criminals will not give up the decryption key that easily. Even if you pay the ransom, the key might remain in their possession. Furthermore, you might be scared to do anything because the notification represented by ShellLocker Ransomware suggests that your files might be deleted permanently if you do “something funny,” whatever that means. Unfortunately, it looks like you can recover your files only if they are backed up. Are they? In that case, you have nothing to worry about. If they are not, you should think about investing in an external drive or setting up cloud storage to ensure that your files are protected against damage and removal in the future.
How are you going to remove ShellLocker Ransomware from your operating system? Will you install an automated malware remover or will you handle all of the tasks yourself? Whether you want to use anti-malware software or you want to find and erase all malicious components manually, you need to reboot into Safe Mode with Networking first. The guide below explains how to do that on different Windows versions. Additional instructions explain how to erase the threat from your PC as well. Will you be able to handle the manual removal of ShellLocker Ransomware? Well, you will not know unless you try, and we are hopeful that you will succeed if you follow the instructions carefully and if you are able to locate the file that has unleashed the ransomware. In most cases, it is a file that you download via a spam email, and so you should be able to discover its location quickly.
Reboot Windows 10:
Reboot Windows 8/Windows 8.1:
Reboot Windows 7/Windows Vista/Windows XP:
Delete malicious components: