Il cryptojacking it is an increasingly widespread practice. The statistics in this regard indicate a constant double-digit growth from year to year of the unauthorized use of a computer, tablet or smartphone in order to undermine cryptocurrencies, deriving from the fact that many Internet users know practically nothing. In practice, thousands and thousands of sites are affected by abusive miners in order to exploit their calculation capacity without undergoing any outlay.
What is cryptojacking
The term cryptojacking derives from the combination of cryptocurrency (cryptocurrency) and hijacking (or hijacking). Occurs as a result ofentering a code in a site and once the operation is completed, once visited by a user, it diverts part of the processing power of its equipment (in a percentage usually ranging between 50 and 60%) in order to use it, without having been issued no permit, in order to extract cryptocurrencies through mining processes. Only once the internet user has left the site, the hijacking operation will end.
The most immediate consequence, when it takes place, is a significant slowing down of the affected device, as an abundant part of its resources is used for the calculation activity. Moreover, it is precisely the excessive use of the processing capacity of the confiscated equipment that can, in principle, lead to a greater expenditure of electricity. Finally, in the case of portable devices, the battery will be subjected to an overload that will consume it more quickly.
Now Wav files are also used for criptojacking
The researchers of BlackBerry Cylance, a company that deals with the development of antivirus software, recently provided for the reporting of the presence of malicious code hidden within Wav audio files, aimed at mining Monero. The same company explained that in the course of their reproduction, the offending files produced music without any glitch or giving rise to evident quality problems, or they generated only static noise.
This is practically a novelty, considered as so far cryptojacking has been carried out precisely by inserting code within sites or through the notorious Phishing, or by sending e-mails containing an e-mail trojan, relying in all evidence on improper behavior by the users involved. In this last category, for example, the malware discovered by Prevailion, a cyberintelligence company, generated in Russia and not particularly sophisticated. A discovery that adds up to that made in September, when Juniper Networks managed to locate one Spyware can take advantage of the popular Telegram application in order to steal the cryptocurrency wallets of the affected users.
As you can easily understand, however, these are different practices. Cryptojacking is practically limited to surreptitiously exploiting the resources of computers and other intercepted devices to do simple mining, however gaining important figures every month just in consideration of the high number of people involved. Instead, using spyware and other malicious software to empty affected users' wallets is one real criminal operation.
