Napoleon virus - How to remove

Napoleon is named after a well-known historical figure, and you know why is that? Because it adds the extension .napaleon to the files it encrypts. It is a rather typical ransomware infection, that aims to infect computer, encrypt files and require ransom to be paid in order to unlock them.

Yesterday we have talked about Wannasmile Ransomware infection which also encrypts files and requires irrational amount of money to be paid. Developers of Napoleon infection are more down to the earth because the size of the ransom is much more reasonable. Nonetheless, if this infection lands on your computer, you will face a bunch of serious cyber security problems.

In this article we are going to run through most important features of this infection, discuss the way it is distributed and what possible options do you have in this situation.

Napoleon ransomware – extremely dangerous computer virus

We would like to start off by saying that consequences caused by Napoleon virus can be really detrimental. To put it short – you will lose all of your files, they will be damaged and not accessible.

How can you possibly get infected with this virus? Well, there are several most common ways. Most of cyber criminals just launch mal spam campaigns and distributed files of the virus as an attachment to email letters. We do not know if it’s primary distribution path in this particular case, but you should never open emails (especially files attached to the emails) that ended up in the spam folder on your email or looks fishy. General rule here is not to open emails if you are not aware of the person or company that sent it. Do not believe in various offers or “important information” sent to you by email and placed in the attached files – this trick is really old, yet some users fall for it.

Because of incredibly high volumes of emails that are sent by cyber criminals, hundreds or even thousands of naive users get infected. And that’s all what it takes – once inside of the computer, Napoleon ransomware will execute encryption process automatically. Most of your personal files stored on a hard drive will be encrypted. Extension .napoleon or .[[email protected]].napoleon will be added to the end of every single one of them and a ransom note will be opened on your desktop automatically. It says:

Attention!
Your documents, photos, databases and other important files have been encrypted cryptographically strong, without the original key recovery is impossible! To decrypt your files you need to buy the special software – NAPOLEON DECRYPTED Using another tools could corrupt your files, in case of using third party software we don’t give guarantees that full recovery is possible so use it on your own risk.
If you want to restore files, write us to the e-mail: [email protected] In subject line write encryption and attach your ID in body of your message also attach to email 3 crypted files. (files have to less than 2MB)
It is in your interest to respond as soon as possible to ensure the restoration of your files, because we wont keep your decryption keys at our server more than one week in interest of our security.
Only in case you do not receive a response from the first email address within 48 hours, please use this alternative email address: [email protected]
Your personal identification number:

As usually, old tricks are used – users are encouraged to send up to 3 encrypted files, so cyber criminals could encrypt and send them back to you, as a proof that they have a working technology for encryption. Then you will be asked to pay this special software which would allow to unlock your files. They are playing mind games, making users think that they are just purchasing software that will solve their problem and distracting from the fact that they caused this problem and it’s nothing but theft.

We definitely do not recommend you to pay the ransom – there are more than enough reasons not to do that. Instead of that, get yourself reliable anti-malware application, such as SpyHunter Either one of those programs will be able to detect and remove malicious files of Napoleon virus. Unfortunately, anti-malware software can not decrypt your files and no other dedicated software can do that at the moment. That’s why the only way to retrieve encrypted files – restore them from a backup. This requires a backup file, so if you have one, take a look at our step-by-step files restore guide and completely solve the problem.

How to recover Napoleon virus encrypted files and remove the virus

Step 1. Restore system into last known good state using system restore

1. Reboot your computer to Safe Mode with Command Prompt:

for Windows 7 / Vista/ XP

• Start → Shutdown → Restart → OK.
• Press F8 key repeatedly until Advanced Boot Options window appears.
• Choose Safe Mode with Command Prompt.

for Windows 8 / 10

• Press Power at Windows login screen. Then press and hold Shift key and click Restart.
• Choose Troubleshoot → Advanced Options → Startup Settings and click Restart.
• When it loads, select Enable Safe Mode with Command Prompt from the list of Startup Settings.

 

2.Restore System files and settings.

• When Command Prompt mode loads, enter cd restore and press Enter.
• Then enter rstrui.exe and press Enter again.
• Click “Next” in the windows that appeared.
• Select one of the Restore Points that are available before Napoleon virus has infiltrated to your system and then click “Next”.
• To start System restore click “Yes”.

 

Step 2. Complete removal of Napoleon virus

After restoring your system, it is recommended to scan your computer with an anti-malware program, like Spyhunter and remove all malicious files related to Napoleon virus . You can check other tools here.  

Step 3. Restore Napoleon virus affected files using Shadow Volume Copies

If you do not use System Restore option on your operating system, there is a chance to use shadow copy snapshots. They store copies of your files that point of time when the system restore snapshot was created. Usually Napoleon virus tries to delete all possible Shadow Volume Copies, so this methods may not work on all computers. However, it may fail to do so. Shadow Volume Copies are only available with Windows XP Service Pack 2, Windows Vista, Windows 7, and Windows 8. There are two ways to retrieve your files via Shadow Volume Copy. You can do it using native Windows Previous Versions or via Shadow Explorer. a) Native Windows Previous Versions Right-click on an encrypted file and select Properties → Previous versions tab. Now you will see all available copies of that particular file and the time when it was stored in a Shadow Volume Copy. Choose the version of the file you want to retrieve and click Copy if you want to save it to some directory of your own, or Restore if you want to replace existing, encrypted file. If you want to see the content of file first, just click Open.

b) Shadow Explorer It is a program that can be found online for free. You can download either a full or a portable version of Shadow Explorer. Open the program. On the left top corner select the drive where the file you are looking for is a stored. You will see all folders on that drive. To retrieve a whole folder, right-click on it and select “Export”. Then choose where you want it to be stored.

Step 4. Use Data Recovery programs to recover Napoleon virus encrypted files

There are several data recovery programs that might recover encrypted files as well. This does not work in all cases but you can try this:

• We suggest using another PC and connect the infected hard drive as slave. It is still possible to do this on infected PC though.
• Download a data recovery program.
• Install and scan for recently deleted files.

Note: In many cases it is impossible to restore data files affected by modern ransomware. Thus I recommend using decent cloud backup software as precaution. We recommend checking out Carbonite, BackBlaze, CrashPlan or Mozy Home.

Manual removal