The technical details of security vulnerabilities impacting Vulnerability-related.DiscoverVulnerability the Nvidia Video and an Android driver have been revealed Vulnerability-related.DiscoverVulnerability by Zimperium , which acquired the flaws as part of an exploit acquisition program . On Tuesday , Zimperium zLabs researchers published Vulnerability-related.DiscoverVulnerability a blog post detailing the security flaws , two escalation of privilege bugs found Vulnerability-related.DiscoverVulnerability within the NVIDIA Video driver and MSM Thermal driver . The Nvidia bug , CVE-2016-2435 , impacts Vulnerability-related.DiscoverVulnerability Android 6.0 on the Nexus 9 handset . The problem arises Vulnerability-related.DiscoverVulnerability when attackers craft an application to tamper with read/write memory values and force privilege escalation . The second security flaw , CVE-2016-2411 , involves Vulnerability-related.DiscoverVulnerability a Qualcomm power management kernel driver , the MSM Thermal driver , in Android version 6 . If an attacker crafts a malicious application , they can give themselves root access through an internal bug in the driver , leading to privilege escalation . These bugs are well documented Vulnerability-related.DiscoverVulnerability , known Vulnerability-related.DiscoverVulnerability , and for the most part security updates have been issued Vulnerability-related.PatchVulnerability . However , Zimperium says Vulnerability-related.DiscoverVulnerability that making the technical details available of these so-called Vulnerability-related.DiscoverVulnerability `` N-day '' flaws is important and can act as a catalyst to boost the speed of patch production and to iron out problems arriving between a patch being created Vulnerability-related.PatchVulnerability and vendors distributing Vulnerability-related.PatchVulnerability the update in good time . In February , Zimperium launched Vulnerability-related.DiscoverVulnerability an N-day acquisition program which is only interested in known security problems , rather than unknown and unpatched zero-days . Over the next year , the exploit purchaser is budgeting a total of $ 1.5 million to pick up the details on these exploits . Once a bug has been discovered Vulnerability-related.DiscoverVulnerability and a fix is being worked on Vulnerability-related.PatchVulnerability , an N-day exploit indicates a time of one or more days in which user systems can be compromised until a security update is issued Vulnerability-related.PatchVulnerability . `` By focusing on N-days , or patched vulnerabilities , Zimperium is applying pressure on the mobile ecosystem to re-think how and when users receive Vulnerability-related.PatchVulnerability security updates , '' the company said at the time . `` [ The ] program will reward the hard work of researchers who would n't otherwise receive compensation for an N-day exploit . ''

One tried-and-true technique continues to be hiding malware inside fake versions of popular files , then distributing Attack.Phishing those fake versions via app stores . Doing the same via peer-to-peer BitTorrent networks has also long been popular . But as with so many supposedly free versions of paid-for applications , users may get more than they bargained for . To wit , last week researchers at the security firm ESET spotted new ransomware - Filecoder.E - circulating via BitTorrent , disguised as Attack.Phishing a `` patcher '' that purports to allow Mac users to crack such applications as Adobe Premiere Pro CC and Microsoft Office 2016 . As Toronto-based security researcher Cheryl Biswas notes in a blog post : `` For those who torrent , be careful . ESET says the ransomware can also encrypt any Time Machine backups on network-connected volumes that are mounted at the time of the attack Attack.Ransom . If the ransomware infects a system , it demands Attack.Ransom 0.25 bitcoins - currently worth about $ 300 - for a decryption key . But ESET security researcher Marc-Etienne M.L Éveillé , in a blog post , says the application is so poorly coded that there 's no way that a victim could ever obtain a decryption key . So far , ESET reports that the single bitcoin wallet tied to the ransomware has received no payments . `` There is one big problem with this ransomware : It does n't have any code to communicate with any C & C ; server , '' says Éveillé , referring to a command-and-control server that might have been used to remotely control the infected endpoint . `` This means that there is no way the key that was used to encrypt the files can be sent to the malware operators . This also means that there is no way for them to provide a way to decrypt a victim 's files . '' The longstanding ransomware-defense advice , of course , is to never pay ransoms Attack.Ransom , because this directly funds cybercrime groups ' ongoing research and development . Instead , stay prepared : Keep complete , disconnected backups of all systems , and periodically test that they can be restored , and thus never have to consider paying a ransom Attack.Ransom . `` We advise that victims never pay the ransom Attack.Ransom when hit by ransomware , '' Éveillé says . In other ransomware news , new ransomware known as Trump Locker - not to be confused with Trumpcryption - turns out to be a lightly repackaged version of VenusLocker ransomware , according to Lawrence Abrams of the security analysis site Bleeping Computer , as well as the researchers known as MalwareHunter Team . `` Unfortunately , you are hacked , '' the start of the malware's ransom demand Attack.Ransom reportedly reads . VenusLocker first appeared in October 2016 ; it got a refresh two months later . The researchers do n't know if the group distributing Trump Locker is the same group that distributed VenusLocker , or if another group of attackers reverse-engineered the code . But they say that functionally , the two pieces of malware appear to be virtually identical , Bleeping Computer reports . For example , both Trump Locker and VenusLocker will encrypt some files types in full , while only encrypting the first 1024 bytes of other file types , including PDF , XLS , DOCX , and MP3 file formats . Fully encrypted files have `` .TheTrumpLockerf '' appended to their filename , while partially encrypted files get a `` .TheTrumpLockerp '' extension added , the researchers say . Finally , ransomware gangs ' use of customer service portals - to help and encourage victims to pay their ransoms Attack.Ransom - continues , says Mikko Hypponen , chief research officer of Finnish security firm F-Secure . One chief function of this support appears to be to help victims who do n't know their Windows from their ASP to find a way to remit bitcoins Attack.Ransom to attackers , according to research into crypto-ransomware called Spora and its related customer-support operation , conducted by F-Secure 's Sean Sullivan .