Posts tagged scareware

I got a call from a very freaked-out relative a few weeks ago.. this person was very, very worried because out of the blue a program was telling them that they had a ton of viruses on their system and they were being warned that their personal banking information had been exposed to hackers. I got this person to calm down a bit and asked if they had clicked on anything in that window.. and luckily they hadn’t. This person had nearly fallen prey to a type of potential malware called “scareware”.

What is “Scareware”, you ask?  Technically speaking.. it is a piece of software designed to fool the average computer user into paying for a service that they don’t need by convincing them that they do in fact need what the scammer is selling.  The most common scareware I’ve seen in the past few months is the very same one that my relative stumbled upon.. a fake antivirus program that looks very, very real – all the way down to the Windows Vista-styled icons.  In this case the fake AV program was only a pop-up ad, albeit a very dangerous one.. click anywhere in the window and, voila – spyware infection.  This is the very reason that you need to know exactly what antivirus and anti-spyware you have installed on your system.. if something different comes up you can kill it via the Windows taskbar.

If you’re not sure what antivirus or anti-spyware software you’re currently running is called I’ll be happy to help you.. just drop me a line.