This weeks blog is a warning to all of my readers of a virus and spyware phone call scam that is going around and this is real folks, not fake. No need to check with snopes.com. I am going to ask after reading this, you DO forward this blog link to your friends/family/college kids, etc. Anyone who has a computer and has a phone.
Here is the situation.
One of my networking colleagues calls me a few days ago to tell me that she got a call from someone (named Mark, with an accent appearing to be from India) who said she was sending out “spyware” and they needed to remote in and do a check on her computer. They also said they charged $129. They also said they were representing “Windows Microsoft”.
I called their number on their website to check them out as asked a few questions. They told me that they call people with viruses that are Windows Microsoft owners to alert them, it was very fishy. They also said that once the client agrees to the service, they will not give back refunds. It appeared to be a smaller call center by the sounds in the back and when I asked for a supervisor, the first guy on the phone said, “She wants to talk to a supervisor” and hands over the phone to the supervisor.
First thing folks, no one should ever call you about computer issues but maybe your internet provider or your friends with these following reasons:
Now, moving on…
My networking colleagues moves on to tell me that this company started installing programs and while she watched them work, she took very good notes on what they did. One thing though that happened that caused me a lot of concern was that they talked her into doing things that she said she wasn’t sure she should do, such as log into her bank account to pay them (basically, so they could see her account number) and I’m quite sure they put in a keylogger program (to get her password).
After 2 hours, she wasn’t comfortable with the call, their service and the whole thing so she reported it to her bank to file a discrepancy. She told the company she was going to do it and they said she would see a credit on her account, but she didn’t feel comfortable yet again with that.
Unfortunately, she got scammed. But this is getting more common as I did some research on the internet. Trust me, no one from Microsoft is going to be calling you about anything, PERIOD. They simply do not call you unless you ask them for help with your computer. And you will know that because you contacted them first.
Here are a few things to watch for:
As I hate to say that it’s the “people from India” doing this, this is the current scam and I am just playing virus advocate to help spread the word on what’s going on.
Interested in having us do your hardware repairs? Call others first and get quotes or save yourself and be sure you get the most affordable, fast turnaround repairs by Calling That Girl! Our St. Louis Park location offers friendly service and knowledable technicians.
Minneapolis Office (Call us first please to insure the best level of support, somtimes our remote services are best!
Hours 10am-6pm
PC/Networking Support
Laptop power jack replacement and repair
Laptop screen replacement
Laptop keyboard replacement
Desktop computer hardware repair
Crashed hard drives
Data recovery
Blue screens of death repair
5871 Cedar Lake Rd. #214
St. Louis Park, MN 55416
612-865-4475
Hello 2011!! Call That Girl is all staffed up and ready to head into this exciting new year! To celebrate the growth we are experiencing, why not share the joy with one of our computer cleaning sales!
So, here is the deal. You’ve been suffering with a slow and sluggish computer, right? For $60, you get an all-inclusive cleaning, inspection and maintenance check….no time limits, one flat fee…AND if you want to have us remove your Norton, McAfee, AVG, Trend Products, we do that too in the cleaning. For an extra 25 buckaroos, you can get a 2 for 1 LIFETIME license of one our new favorite malware products, SuperAntiSpyware.
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A computer cleaning is great if you:
Rules:
The computer cleaning includes:
Our computer cleanings usually take an hour, but may go longer than that due to upgrades and scans. We have changed our billing for all computer cleanings to be a flat fee, no more hourly billing.
Feel free to forward this email to any of your friends and family.
Today I got a call from a client that caught some scareware that really did scare her, and her computer to the point it almost crashed her computer. Almost. She called That Girl and we got her back up and running.
What happened? She was on the internet and just surfing around, like most of you do on Sunday mornings. She clicked on something she was going to look at and next thing she knew, she had downloaded something and it brought up a window stating she had to buy a removal program for X amount of dollars.
This folks, is scareware, but can have a back end of malware. Malware is malicious software (mal-ware). If she had started to click on the program and try to close it down, it would have downloaded malware and started to cause chaos in her computer. And unfortunately, this client did click on the pictures enough and lost access to the internet.
Sometimes, it’s worse than this! Many times it causes your windows to crash and you can’t boot your computer up normally. 9 times out of 10, if you Call That Girl, we can walk you through getting your computer up again and run some scanner tools to remove the scareware, malware and spyware that was downloaded into your system.
We are also big believers in using great protection, not AVG 2011, Norton, McAfee, Trend, WebRoot, etc. Scareware, Malware and spyware get right through this big box programs (Norton is the worst at catching it!!!) We are firm believers in buying the real time protection (Malwarebytes) of the program that we use to clean up your scareware, malware and spyware!
If you are reading and want to make sure you have protection that works, read these instructions for downloading, installing and configuring Malwarebytes. It’s one of our favorites and we are resellers of this product.
https://callthatgirl.biz/malwarebytes-installation-and-configuration
If this is too much for you to understand, please fill out the form below to schedule some time for us to help you, we can also remove your other programs (that usually don’t work!) and get you a refund if you have recently purchased Norton. They have an awesome refund page!
Call That Girl is also now supporting SuperAntiSpyware moving ahead in 2011. Watch for details!
I had a computer mishap over the holidays, nothing serious…but you know this old Dell I keep bringing back to life? Well, it’s finally near deaths door. It had a serious issue over the holidays and I set up my basement computer to have a 2nd available at any time. Not all of you have a 2nd computer so you can’t do what I did, was make copies of all of my stuff and put on that 2nd computer just in case! (I also have Mozy Online Backup on the old Dell too).
It can be a shock and somewhat scary for some folks when they come down from bed, get coffee brewing and start up their computer to nothing. No power, no windows splash screen, no song of “My computer is booting up”. I have had this happen to me in the past (last year when I finally killed my original HP computer!!). It just isn’t a good feeling to know that you computer finally croaked, but to feel that you are CONFIDENT that your stuff is backed up is a GREAT feeling.
Mozy Online Backup is a awesome online backup software tool that allows you to do 2 gigs free to try them out, or you can purchase unlimited for $55 a year. Many of our clients do the unlimited as most of us have more than 2 gigs to back up. $55 to save all of your precious memories? You bet it’s a good deal!
If you would like to try out the 2 gigs free, click here!
If you would like us to help you set up the unlimited, click here to book an appointment. Our usual rates is $48.75 to set this up, but for this week only, we will offer it for $35.
As most of you know, I have been blogging since early 2008. I really enjoy it, it’s fun for me to do, but I want to make sure that I’m helping everyone get the most computer help they need. Have you read one of my blogs in the past and wondered, “She should blog about this idea”? Now it’s your time to tell us and help us build our blog directory for 2011.
Feel free to comment in the comment section below. I will review all ideas. Many of my blog ideas come straight from my clients, they call in with a problem and I think about whether or not it’s a good blog. Sometimes the iron strikes HOT and I’m writing the next day, sometimes the iron has to get hot and I blog about it later on.
No ideas are bad ideas here folks! Let’s see what you got.
