Merry I Love You Bruce Virus File Removal (+File Recovery)

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Welcome to our “Merry I Love You Bruce” Virus File removal guide. The following instructions will aid you in removing the unwanted software from your PC.

“Merry I Love You Bruce” Virus is a very dangerous threat, which, once it has compromised your computer, immediately applies a malicious encryption to all of your valuable files. If you have fallen victim to its encryption, then you should prepare to deal with Ransomware. Fortunately, you have come just to the right place, because on this page we are going to give you some details about what exactly this kind of malware is, how harmful it could be and how to remove it from your computer and clean your system from all of its traces. You may find it very useful to learn how you can possibly restore some of your encrypted files as well as how to prevent such nasty infections in the future. So, stay with us until the end, because at the end of this article we have prepared a removal guide that will show you exactly how to delete “Merry I Love You Bruce” Virus from your machine.

“Merry I Love You Bruce” – how dangerous can this threat be?

Discovered just recently, “Merry I Love You Bruce” falls in the category of one of the most malicious types of software that has ever been created – the Ransomware. You have probably heard about this dreadful threat somewhere in the news, because Ransomware is today among the top online hazards that one could encounter. What is more, this online blackmail scheme keeps evolving and coming up with newer and more sophisticated versions, the latest of which is “Merry I Love You Bruce”. This cryptovirus is used basically to prevent access to your data by encrypting it and then keep it hostage until you pay ransom to the criminals behind the Ransomware. With no doubt, this is a very nasty form of online robbery and what is even nastier about it is that it is getting more and more popular among the criminal circles who keep causing huge data and financial losses to thousands of unsuspecting users and businesses.

How can you get infected with “Merry I Love You Bruce”?

Ransomware may be lurking everywhere and this is also valid for “Merry I Love You Bruce”. Usually, what the criminals do is they spread the infection in various ways to ensure that they can infect as many people as possible and, of course, blackmail them for their data. For that, they mostly use methods like malvertising, where the malicious payload is hidden in fake ads, misleading links and compromised web pages. Spam email campaigns with harmful attachments and Trojan horse infections are also used to deliver the Ransomware to the users’ machines. If the users click on such transmitters, whether by mistake or out of curiosity, they will immediately activate the infection. What is even worse is that there would be hardly any symptoms that may indicate that an infection has happened and the users will know about it only after the Ransomware has completed its harmful encryption to all of the files, found on the infected machine.

How can you possibly recover from the encryption?

When “Merry I Love You Bruce” completes the encryption process, the criminals behind the Ransomware would place a ransom note on your screen, revealing the harmful results from the infection. Now, the first thing that you need to do when you see the ransom note is to remain calm and avoid making any impulsive decisions. You may be put under a lot of pressure to pay the required ransom as soon as possible and in most cases the crooks will give you a short deadline to do that in case that you want your files back. They will promise to send you a decryption key that can unlock your data the moment you transfer the money, however, you should better take your time to carefully consider the risks of trusting the criminals.

Most security experts, who fight against Ransomware, would advise you against paying the ransom and there are a few good reasons for that. First of all, there is absolutely no guarantee that once you make the payment, the crooks will really send you the promised decryption key. In fact, the sad statistic shows that once they get your money, they simply fade away and the chance of hearing back from them is close to zero. You may only lose your money and still be left with no decryption solution for your data. With Ransomware on your system, however, your PC can easily be exposed to even more online threats that’s why it is important you remove the malware from your computer as soon as possible. However, we need to warn you that your files will not get decrypted once you clean the system from the infection. Unfortunately, the consequences of the Ransomware encryption may not be reversible, but still you can try to restore some of your files with the help of the instructions in the guide below. If you have some backups, kept on external drives or a cloud, it would be even easier to recover from the attack, but first make sure you completely remove “Merry I Love You Bruce” and all of its traces from your machine.

“Merry I Love You Bruce” Virus File Removal

 Here is what you need to do in order to remove a Ransomware virus from you computer.

I – Reveal Hidden files and folders and utilize the task manager

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1. Use the Folder Options in order to reveal the hidden files and folders on your PC. If you do not know how to do that, follow this link.
2. Open the Start Menu and in the search field type Task Manager.
   
3. Open the first result and in the Processes tab, carefully look through the list of Processes.
4. If you notice with the virus name or any other suspicious-looking or that seems to consume large amounts of memory, right-click on it and open its file location. Delete everything in there.
   

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• Make sure that the hidden files and folders on your PC are visible, else you might not be able to see everything.

5. Go back to the Task Manager and end the shady process.

II – Boot to Safe Mode

• Boot your PC into Safe Mode. If you do not know how to do it, use this guide/linked/.

III – Identify the threat

1. Go to the ID Ransomware website. Here is a direct link.
2. Follow there in order to identify the specific virus you are dealing with.

IV – Decrypt your files

1. Once you have identified the virus that has encrypted your files, you must acquire the respective tool to unlock your data.
2. Open your browser and search for how to decrypt ransomware, look for the name of the one that has infected your system.
3. With any luck, you’d be able to find a decryptor tool for your ransomware. If that doesn’t happen try Step V as a last ditch effort to save your files.

V – Use Recuva to restore files deleted by the virus

1. Download the Recuva tool. This will help you restore your original files so that you won’t need to actually decrypt the locked ones.
2. Once you’ve downloaded the program, open it and select Next.
   
3. Now choose the type of files you are seeking to restore and continue to the next page.
4. When asked where your files were, before they got deleted, either use the option In a specific location and provide that location or choose the opt for the I am not sure alternative – this will make the program look everywhere on your PC.
   
5. Click on Next and for best results, enable the Deep Scan option (note that this might take some time).
   
6. Wait for the search to finish and then select which of the listed files you want to restore.

• Keep in mind it is possible that not all files might be fully recovered. You can check in what condition the files are from the State column in the list of deleted files.