Hello, Scareware!

[Negeva]

Nowadays, many internet users are educated about many threats to their security such as viruses, trojans and malware (spyware) and financial well-being through phishing scams. But, what scareware does is mix this up to a whole new level.

Scareware can be called a close relative of phishing scams: where legitimate emails from a financial institution arrives asking you to re-verify all your key information. However, phishing has received far greater media coverage that even my grannie and her friends all now about it.
And, it is because of this greater education of the people that scareware has thrived. Many of us are use to seeing that little Microsoft pop-up informing us of an urgent update and it is this that scareware exploits. An official looking pop-up from the 'clock area' telling you are infected with 100s of viruses and you need to visit this site for a full scan immediately!

According to Eric Sites from Sunbelt Software talking to the BBC:

In the last six months we have seen an enormous uptick in the number of people getting infected by these scareware or spyware agents. They are becoming a lot more prevalent and the 'scare and scam' is all about getting money out of the user...

And so Microsoft with the State Attorney for Washington have decided to take these people and companies to task. As you can read here:

http://atg.wa.gov/uploadedFiles/Home...tryCleaner.pdf
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/technology/7645420.stm
http://voices.washingtonpost.com/sec...state_tar.html

In the meantime, you might as well ask what you can do to protect yourself. Well, for starters don't panic and grab your credit card. That isn't the solution. Scareware relies on you to reach for your credit card in fear, desperation and panic. Instead make sure you have a well-known and trusted internet security application(s) in place; such as the ones listed at the end of this piece, keep updated about any fake/rogue security suites at Spywarewarrior's Rogue/Suspect Anti-Spyware Products. And more importantly remember to use a bit of common sense.

Trusted Anti-Virus: LINK

Trusted Anti-Spyware/Malware:

Spybot Search and Destory
Malwarebytes
SUPERAntiSpyware

[rjfvillarosa]

Thanks for the information Negeva.

I am going to sticky this thread for the time being.