---
title: When malware strikes and leaves no evidence
description: "We’re all familiar with the term “malware”: malicious software that, for decades, has corrupted data and been stopped by anti-virus and anti-malware suites. As implied by its name, malicious software has a malicious executable file or DLL as the main host of their malicious functionality delivery. Malicious software has been studied by IT security companies for years. Researchers and developers are quite familiar with it and, at a certain point, cybercriminals understood that they had to invent or explore new attack vectors. That’s how fileless attacks with the “living-off-the-land” approach appeared. The concept has been around for decades and was heavily used on Unix attacks in the past, but it got new life recently on Windows systems."
canonical_url: https://www.acronis.com/en/resource-center/resource/when-malware-strikes-and-leaves-no-evidence/
locale: en
last_updated: 2026-10-11
---

June 18, 2020

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# When malware strikes and leaves no evidence

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[Deutsch](https://www.acronis.com/de/resource-center/resource/when-malware-strikes-and-leaves-no-evidence/)  
[简体中文](https://www.acronis.com/zh/resource-center/resource/when-malware-strikes-and-leaves-no-evidence/)  
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We’re all familiar with the term “malware”: malicious software that, for decades, has corrupted data and been stopped by anti-virus and anti-malware suites. As implied by its name, malicious software has a malicious executable file or DLL as the main host of their malicious functionality delivery. Malicious software has been studied by IT security companies for years. Researchers and developers are quite familiar with it and, at a certain point, cybercriminals understood that they had to invent or explore new attack vectors. That’s how fileless attacks with the “living-off-the-land” approach appeared. The concept has been around for decades and was heavily used on Unix attacks in the past, but it got new life recently on Windows systems.   
  
 As you would expect from a modern cybersecurity solution, **Acronis Cyber Protect** can detect and stop fileless malware with its multilayered approach to a threat response.