It wasn’t too long ago when Grand Theft Auto fans were rejoicing after game publisher Rockstar announced that it was about to release the latest updates for GTA V, as well as the launch of the game for PCs.
Now it appears that hackers were actually rejoicing along with them as they— in some way— managed to infiltrate Rockstar’s system and was somehow able to sneak in password-stealing viruses along with the so-called “mods” or modifications that players download to modify the game.
GTA V players have enjoyed humpback whales that were literally raining from the skies of their Grand Theft Auto world, while having fun blasting their weapons away with an entire car, instead of the usual ammunitions, through these modifications.
But behind these fun mods appears to be a sinister activity running in the background.
A GTA V fanatic was observant enough to notice that something doesn’t look right in two of the most popular mods being downloaded by his fellow Grand Theft Auto Fanatics.
The issue was first made known when a user posted about the alarming observation on GTAForums, where a file called “fade.exe” seems to have been secretly added to the modifications, clearly with a sinister intention.
The sinister file was later on discovered as a ‘keylogger’, a program designed specifically to keep track of the users’ passwords and save them. The file also appeared to have granted itself access to the internet, presumably for it to be able to transmit all of the passwords it has managed to record, back to its makers.
According to a user who goes by the name ‘aboutseven’ on his the GTAForums post:
“The Fade.exe had hijacked an official system file, the C# Compiler, and was accessing the internet while keeping what seems to be logs of my system in the hidden temp directory.”
“I noticed all the mods that I had downloaded for GTA V had matched the date when this folder was created.”
The two mods found to be carrying the password-stealing virus were ‘Noclip’, which gives Grand Theft Auto V users the ability to check out the inside of objects ingame, as well as mod called ‘Angry Planes’, which generates hostile planes dedicated to destroy GTA players.
Sites that hosted the said mods have since took down the modification downloads, and Grand Theft Auto V users who downloaded the said mods are advised to check if they’ve been hit by the password-stealing virus.
Those who find their PCs infected by they keylogger virus can follow a step-by-step set of instructions on how they could permanently remove the virus off of their computers— also courtesy of the same guy who discovered its existence.
