{"id":53285,"date":"2018-10-05T17:29:00","date_gmt":"2018-10-05T17:29:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.gamasutra.com\/view\/news\/328058"},"modified":"2018-10-05T17:29:00","modified_gmt":"2018-10-05T17:29:00","slug":"a-closer-look-at-the-malware-that-masquerades-as-fortnite-cheats","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/sickgaming.net\/blog\/2018\/10\/05\/a-closer-look-at-the-malware-that-masquerades-as-fortnite-cheats\/","title":{"rendered":"A closer look at the malware that masquerades as Fortnite cheats"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Malware that lures unsuspecting people into giving away personal information by promising cheats or free currency for big online games is not a brand new concept, and the age-old scams are currently running amok with Epic\u2019s free-to-play battle royale game <em>Fortnite<\/em>.<\/p>\n<p>The company behind the anti-malware software Malwarebytes, for example, has <a href=\"https:\/\/blog.malwarebytes.com\/cybercrime\/2018\/10\/fortnite-gamers-targeted-by-data-theft-malware\/\">tracked down one particular scam<\/a> that\u2019s been making the rounds while disguised as a <em>Fortnite<\/em> cheat. The scam itself is similar to one <a href=\"http:\/\/gamasutra.com\/view\/news\/321200\/Streaming_platform_devs_take_down_Fortnite_adware_chide_Epic_for_not_doing_it_itself.php\">unearthed earlier this year<\/a> by the streaming platform Rainway, as well as several others that can be found online at any given moment.<\/p>\n<p>But what makes Malwarebytes&#8217; report particularly interesting is its dive into how the malware itself actually operates. The specific malicious program the company tracks has grabbed a little over 1,200 downloads to date and attempts to steal information from infected systems about everything from cookies and Steam sessions to Bitcoin wallet info.<\/p>\n<p>This particular \u201ccheat\u201d originates from a YouTube video that grabbed over 2,000 views in its first day live and promises an undetectable <em>Fortnite<\/em> aimbot, <em>Fortnite<\/em> hacks, loot detecting tools, along with other cheats. A link in the description sends would-be cheaters to a page that promises to deliver a link to the cheat download in exchange for a YouTube channel subscribe, something that Malwarebytes notes is slightly different from the more survey-focused route most malicious programs take. From there, the site directs people to a second site that offers <em>Fortnite<\/em> cheats, and then a file hosting site to download\u00a0 the \u201ccheat\u201d itself, which Malwarebytes\u2019 software IDs as a \u2018trojen.malpack\u2019 that aims to take info on browser sessions, cookies, Bitcoin wallets, and Steam sessions to an IP based out of the Russian Federation.<\/p>\n<p>The site\u2019s <a href=\"https:\/\/blog.malwarebytes.com\/cybercrime\/2018\/10\/fortnite-gamers-targeted-by-data-theft-malware\/\">blog post<\/a> has a full breakdown that&#8217;s worth checking out about how this specific bit of malware targets the systems and personal information of <em>Fortnite<\/em> players looking for an illegitimate leg up on their competition.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Malware that lures unsuspecting people into giving away personal information by promising cheats or free currency for big online games is not a brand new concept, and the age-old scams are currently running amok with Epic\u2019s free-to-play battle royale game Fortnite. The company behind the anti-malware software Malwarebytes, for example, has tracked down one particular [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":53286,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[20],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-53285","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/sickgaming.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/53285","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/sickgaming.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/sickgaming.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sickgaming.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sickgaming.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=53285"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/sickgaming.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/53285\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sickgaming.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/53286"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/sickgaming.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=53285"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sickgaming.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=53285"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sickgaming.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=53285"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}