It’s incredible, the amount of time and resources an individual will put into a scam…
Scareware or Ransomeware is designed to intimidate you into doing something you normally wouldn’t do. In most cases, send money to a complete stranger or a faceless government entity. I recently got a call from one of my favorite customers, Robert. He told me one of his laptops has this weird screen asking for a “money pak”. The screen loads as soon as he turns the computer on with a lot of scary sounding verbiage. It also will not let him get into Windows.
Screenshot from Robert’s computer
Scareware Impersonating the Government?
In all honesty, when Robert explained to me what he was seeing on the screen, I was at a loss for words. I’ve never heard of scareware impersonating a Government Entity in such a way. So I asked him to send a picture of what he was seeing. After I received a picture of the screen I was able to quickly discern it is not official and was indeed scareware. The picture below shows you what to look for:
Breakdown of Scareware: fake laws, etc.
Click on the image to see it full size. If you read the copy, you will notice how weird it sounds. I break it down for you on the right side of the image.
So, Robert did the right thing. He reacted calmly to what was displayed on his screen. Many people might run to CVS to purchase a moneypak to make this go away. Robert called someone who is knowledgeable with computers / viruses and had his issue fixed by the next day.
The lesson to be learned here: Cool heads prevail!