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PSA/HOWTO: Avoid fake mkv torrents. Avoid getting hacked (lemm.ee)

submitted 2 weeks ago by American_Jesus@lemm.ee to c/piracy@lemmy.dbzer0.com

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There are some torrrents showing up with .lnkextension (ex: movie.mp3.lnk, tvshow.mkv.lnk...) and automated software (Sonarr, Radarr, Lidarr, qBittorrent RSS Downloader) could pick those torrents (but not import).

These (fake) torrents include a .lnk file that executes a script on your Windows

HOW TO exclude from download on qBittorrent.

Go to Options -> Downloads
Enable "Exclude file names"
Add patterns:

(one by line)

*.mp4.lnk  
*.mp3.lnk  
*.mkv.lnk
*.torrent.lnk

Or exclude all together: *.lnk

Example on VirusTotal https://www.virustotal.com/gui/file/e74f64df6ebaf3a1b6e3f42591eb6e87d2ac2828eb5a99fd8d3d82c140137fc9/detection

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[-] ReversalHatchery@beehaw.org 154 points 2 weeks ago

thanks Microsoft for hiding extensions by default!

[-] wizardbeard@lemmy.dbzer0.com 41 points 2 weeks ago* (last edited 2 weeks ago)

Yes, but also whoever set the defaults for the *arr tools. Why would any filename with extra shit past the extensions you're looking for be considered an acceptable result?

Tack $ on the end of your regex, for fucks sake.

[-] American_Jesus@lemm.ee 7 points 2 weeks ago* (last edited 2 weeks ago)

Is not regex
https://github.com/qbittorrent/qBittorrent/pull/17106

Examples
*.exe: filter '.exe' file extension.
readme.txt: filter exact file name.
?.txt: filter 'a.txt', 'b.txt' but not 'aa.txt'.
readme[0-9].txt: filter 'readme1.txt', 'readme2.txt' but not 'readme10.txt'

[-] ad_on_is@lemm.ee 20 points 2 weeks ago* (last edited 2 weeks ago)

Microsoft: De nada, amigo! Oh... here's an ad, btw... and...did you enable Recall already?

[-] ReversalHatchery@beehaw.org 12 points 2 weeks ago

or rather: oh silly you were so clumsy that you disabled recall by accident again. let us be so kind to re-enable it for you

[-] Boomkop3@reddthat.com 4 points 2 weeks ago

Have you tried setting your region to Europe? it's not an issue here

[-] Aatube@kbin.melroy.org 91 points 2 weeks ago

I use Arch btw

[-] CmdrShepard42@lemm.ee 86 points 2 weeks ago

What if it executes and install Windows 11 on your machine!?

[-] black0ut@pawb.social 40 points 2 weeks ago

Oh lord please have mercy! Blacklisting the file extension right now!

[-] Trent@lemmy.ml 22 points 2 weeks ago

That would be the very worst malware. I mean both the malware that installed it and win11...

[-] Aatube@kbin.melroy.org 8 points 2 weeks ago

ackshually the proprietary .lnk shortcut format can only be run on windows 🤓

[-] avidamoeba@lemmy.ca 4 points 2 weeks ago

A Linux executable can't be named ending on .lnk? 🤔🤔

[-] Aatube@kbin.melroy.org 4 points 2 weeks ago

Making such a polyglot that can run on both systems requires much more effort for little gain.

[-] mexicancartel@lemmy.dbzer0.com 3 points 2 weeks ago

But its not lnk but an executable that needs to be excecuted manually?

[-] American_Jesus@lemm.ee 25 points 2 weeks ago

Me too, but don't want to download GBs of malware and bandwidth

[-] LiveLM@lemmy.zip 17 points 2 weeks ago* (last edited 2 weeks ago)

Weak.
Harbor disaster. Seed the malware. Spread the fruits of chaos amongst the unworthy. Be complicit in their downfall. Feed on their agony ^^/s

[-] catloaf@lemm.ee 1 points 2 weeks ago

.lnk files are less than 4kb

[-] Aatube@kbin.melroy.org 5 points 2 weeks ago

That would seem suspicious. I'm sure they have some way to pad out the size.

[-] catloaf@lemm.ee 5 points 2 weeks ago

Anyone paying attention to size would probably also notice they're just .lnk files.

[-] Aatube@kbin.melroy.org 3 points 2 weeks ago

Not necessarily. Even with "hide extensions" unchecked, Windows hides the .lnk extension by default; it just shows an arrow in the bottom-right corner of the icon, which is plausibly missed when in the list view. I'm surprised antivirus doesn't know about it already tbh.

[-] American_Jesus@lemm.ee 3 points 2 weeks ago* (last edited 2 weeks ago)

Not these ones, some could have more than 1GB, look at the virustotal link, the file had 422MB.

Also Sonarr/Radarr filter torrents by size

Here some examples
https://bt4gprx.com/search?q=The.Lord.of.The.Rings.The.Rings.of.Power.S02E08

Those where posted on 1337x (and removed) and probably other sites, Sonarr can pick those based on release name and torrent size

PS: had to rename the fine from .lnk to .com so virustotal could accept

[-] dsilverz@thelemmy.club 53 points 2 weeks ago

When I read the title, I was thinking of something sophisticated such as hidden executable streams inside the MKV container (IIRC, it's possible to append binary data other than audio, video or subtitles specifically inside a MKV). The ".lnk" trick only works in Windows and, even there, it's easy to prevent: Windows Explorer > Options > Advanced > find and check "Always show extensions for files" (i can't really remember the exact label for this option as I'm not a Windows user, but something like this will be there).

[-] cosmic_skillet@lemmy.ml 27 points 2 weeks ago

I believe you uncheck "Hide extensions for known file types"

[-] dsilverz@thelemmy.club 10 points 2 weeks ago

Exactly! Thanks! I couldn't point the exact label, I've been using Linux for years in a daily basis so I forgot most of the Windows shortcuts/options.

[-] brainw0rms@hexbear.net 12 points 2 weeks ago

Even then, that setting doesn't unhide the ".lnk" file extension, that requires a registry edit: https://www.askvg.com/tip-how-to-show-file-extensions-of-shortcuts-lnk-url-pif-in-windows-explorer/

Although shortcuts are pretty easy to spot in the first place unless you just double-click things without paying attention lol

[-] boredsquirrel@slrpnk.net 46 points 2 weeks ago

Not using Windows helps a ton :)

[-] American_Jesus@lemm.ee 19 points 2 weeks ago

Sonarr will still pick the release and download GBs of malware, and if you don't notice your download directly is filled with GBs of fake torrents

[-] bad_news@lemmy.billiam.net 39 points 2 weeks ago

You gotta love how aggressively they prevent users from seamlessly running executables from the internet, a VERY legitimate common use case, but a desktop shortcut from the internet? Run away!

[-] turkalino@lemmy.yachts 31 points 2 weeks ago

Yet another reminder that piracy on Linux is the way because new files don’t have execute permissions by default

[-] American_Jesus@lemm.ee 12 points 2 weeks ago

On many distros will open with WINE by default, not a big deal, you can just delete ~/.wine. If it does anything

[-] Kuvwert@lemm.ee 18 points 2 weeks ago

Could you just add *.lnk?

[-] can@sh.itjust.works 11 points 2 weeks ago

That's mentioned near the bottom of the post.

[-] woodgen@lemm.ee 17 points 2 weeks ago

that executes a script on your Windows.

I don't have a Windows.

[-] notastatist@feddit.org 4 points 2 weeks ago

Then just draw on your wall.

[-] N0x0n@lemmy.ml 17 points 2 weeks ago* (last edited 2 weeks ago)

For those interested, John Hammond did a video a few months ago about .lnk extension (and other 16 hidden extensions on Windows).

He doesn't go to much or to deep into the subject, but you get a general view how this could be exploitable.

YouTube link

Piped Link

[-] Lojcs@lemm.ee 5 points 2 weeks ago

How is the link file executing malware? Can you put any shell script as the target?

[-] LordeMostarda@lemmy.eco.br 11 points 2 weeks ago

I am pretty sure a link file can open cmd/powershell with parameters to execute commands

[-] montar@lemmy.ml 3 points 2 weeks ago

yep! I've found out browsing hacking/spamming site and i've found something too good to be true, it downloaded archive nested inside other archive and in it was silngle .lnk file leading to "the resource". Peeking inside i've found powershell executing base64 (or base32?) encoded script (it's got commandline option for that. if you want to ask wtf ask microsoft, and tell me), it dl'd some exe from some site and ran it, site was down alredy.

[-] wizardbeard@lemmy.dbzer0.com 7 points 2 weeks ago

You can put the script itself as the link. Shortcut to: powershell -command "Write-Host 'Gonna pwn your shit'"

[-] LostXOR@fedia.io 4 points 2 weeks ago

Also make sure you have file extensions enabled in Explorer, it makes it waaay harder for something like this to work.

[-] DoucheBagMcSwag@lemmy.dbzer0.com 1 points 2 weeks ago

Is that the malware that is undetectable because it runs purely in memory? The name is escaping me

[-] Nexy@lemmy.sdf.org 1 points 2 weeks ago

Nice to know! Thank you!

[-] Xianshi@lemm.ee 1 points 1 week ago

Nice one OP. Just had sonar pick up one of these today named like a proper release of a trusted group. Sonarr didn't move it from qbit but better to not DL it in the first place even though its a linux box