CCleaner Software unknowingly Distributed Malware for a month, Time to Update

CCleaner is a popular software for Windows which helps users free up space, improve the performance of Windows PC. Piriform, the company behind it today discloses that one of its version was compromised, and had been distributing malware for nearly a month. The 32-bit versions of CCleaner 5.33.6162 & CCleaner Cloud 1.07.3191 distributed malicious software between August 15 and September 12. This was identified by Cisco Talos, after which the software wasn’t distributed anymore.

The damage wasn’t just limited to this. The compromised version also carried along malware with it, and it sent various encrypted data from affected PCs to the attackers. It includes information like Names, Windows version, MAC address etc. The encoded information was subsequently submitted to an external IP address 216.126.x.x (this address was hardcoded in the payload. This malware was capable of opening remote access to the attackers which could do a lot of damage, but then Piriform doesn’t have any reports on this

The company is still looking into whereabouts of this mishap, and it will take time for them to find out the origin, and unauthorized code source etc. Avast Threat Labs, the company which acquired Piriform is helping them to figure out rest of the stuff.

That said, it’s time to update your CCleaner version to 5.34 or higher, the latest version is available for download here.