Tuesday, September 22, 2009

Don't Be Fooled By The Fake Anti-virus Phishing Scam

On-Site Technical Solutions doesn't do much residential work any more, but when we do it's often because of the fake anti-virus phishing scam. A couple of our business customers have also downloaded this type of malware. One customer actually gave the crooks their credit card information.

This usually happens when someone goes to a site that contains malware and sooner or later a window pops up indicating that the computer has been infected with loads of malware - click here to fix it!!! Only $79.99 US! Of course the click goes to the hacker that created the infection and the rip-off continues from there.

Of course it doesn't help when trusted sites drop these bombs into your computer. Like the NY Times...

New York Times Tricked Into Serving Scareware Ad

We posted earlier about social engineering, the role it plays in malware and how social engineers manipulate us; Mind Games: How Social Engineers Win Your Confidence

These scams continue to be a multi-million dollar problem. It's difficult for the experts to protect against these threats when computer users invite them into their networks by clicking on these downloads.

The Internet Storm Center laments this fact here; Why is Rogue/Fake AV so successful?

SearchSecurity.com talked about the big money for the crooks in the fake anti-virus business back in July; Panda reports fast-spreading rogueware antivirus fraud rakes in millions

The SearchSecurity.com Security Bytes Blog also talked about this; Successful rogue antivirus hinges on social engineering

Don't click on that window!

Call or text me at 1-949-212-2168.

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