SCAREWARE Pop-Ups

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SCAREWARE pop-ups The day starts like any other, you go to your computer to check email, visit a website, or maybe you want to use Google for some research and out of nowhere, a window pops up with a warning that your computer is “infected” or has a “virus”. It will probably use a bunch of technical sounding language to tell you that your account has “suspicious activity”, or you are at risk of “losing your hard drive”. There will most likely be a phone number in the warning message. Sometimes an alarm will sound, or a man or woman’s voice tells you that this is an urgent matter and to call immediately as you may be at risk and not to shut off your computer or your account will be locked or disabled. When you attempt to close the window, it will disappear then immediately re-open. The pop-up will usually prevent you from being able to use your computer for anything else; giving you the feeling, you have no other choice but to call the number to resolve the issue. These messages and sounds are designed to intimidate you, and to scare you into rushing to fix the issue before you have time to think about calling our CP IT help desk. These tactics are called “scareware”. Recently we have also seen scareware appear on smartphones. These pop-ups usually tell you that viruses have been detected on your phone and direct you to download an App that is supposed to rid your phone of those viruses. However, when you tap on “install” to get the app, you are actually giving permission to download malware to your phone. What should you do if you get scareware pop-ups on your devices? First thing to remember is not to panic, nothing bad is about to happen. If you hear the urgent voice or alarm sounds, do not believe anything it says and do not call the number on the screen. We ask you call the CP IT help desk at 1-800-373-7521 for assistance. If we are unavailable, you can turn down the volume on the device and then try to get rid of the pop-up on a computer. You can try closing the browser (Chrome, Edge, Internet Explorer) by using Windows task manager, or try to restart the computer or smartphone by holding down the power button until it shuts off, wait a minute then restart. Once the device comes back on the scareware pop-ups should not reappear. What would happen if you did call the phone number on the pop-up? The person you talk to would likely claim to be from Microsoft, Google, or a well know antivirus software company, and tell you they detected a problem with your computer. They will request remote access to your computer in order to run a free scan that falsely detects that you have an infected computer, and offer to “fix” the problem for a fee, meanwhile stealing your passwords, credit card number, and potentially other confidential information. Please remember if you are in this situation or a similar one to be skeptical, don’t believe everything you read on the computer screen and never let a stranger into your computer. Contact our IT help desk @ 1-800-373-7521 or via email at [email protected]. We are available Monday-Friday, 9-5 CST with extended hours until 7 PM on Tuesday and our services are available to you at no cost. If you leave us a message, please know we will respond as soon as one of us is available. .

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