Beware The Breaking Bad Ransomware Hitting Australian Computers

Everyone loves Breaking Bad, but you might love it a little less if you get hit by this ‘Los Pollos Hermanos’ ransomware.

Some dastardly hackers – with, admittedly, impeccable taste in television – are circulating a new virus across Australia, demanding up to $1,000 from computer users.

It takes its label from the fast-food chicken joint where BB's anti-hero Walter White took instruction from fastidious kingpin Gustavo Fring. (For a while, anyway.)

Anti-virus company Symantec posted an article to their blog alerting the public to the threat.

The warning from the ransomware is as follows:

Of course, if these guys really knew their TV, they would have built their grift around The Good Wife, which recently had a whole episode centered around this very subject.

However, having slightly better pop culture knowledge than these online thieves will be little comfort if you find yourself having to pony up a cool grand.

Here’s what you need to know:

The malware is being circulated through a zip archive, using a “major courier firm” in its file name.

The malicious file in question within the zip archive is “PENALTY.VBS”

Be safe out there! We hope you fare better in the world than poor Jesse Pinkman. He had the worst luck.