Virus alert warning

[freudo]

I had the same thing happen to me here a couple of days ago, just found out the below from Bodo at tennis.com, where it also happened: (rest of the article is about an 11 yr old phenom at Bolletieri's...
Howdy, everyone. It's good to be home after another brief but stimulating trip to the IMG NIck Bollettieri Tennis Academy. Before I go on, I want to call your attention to a sinister virus that popped up on my screen when I opened TennisWorld a few minutes ago. It begins with a notice that looks exactly like a legitimate message from Microsoft Windows, telling you that your computer may have been infected.


Then it conducts a bogus - but realistic-looking - scan and tells you that you have numerous infections. It then directs you to download an anti-virus fix - all in graphics, fonts and a format that look exactly like typical messages from Windows.


Do not download the anti-virus program and by all means do NOT run (or "execute") it if you did. That's how the virus enters your computer, after which it somehow travels from your machine to those of others. I almost fell for this trick a few days ago on my HP netbook - I got as far as downloading the program, but when I had a message from Microsoft warning me that they couldn't authenticate the source of the virus-making bogus anti-virus program, I decided not to run it, and trashed the program. Beware. This is a nasty one.

[janie]

Haha, you poor Windows saps and your viruses and spyware etc. (no offense meant to you, dear freudo!)

[leelee]

Us poor Windows saps that save money and never get virii and spyware cuz we got skillz.

[The Chloe]

General rule of thumb - if a site prompts you to download shit when you aren't expecting it to... don't.

Nonetheless, thanks for the heads up.

[leelee]

Well said, Chole.

I think I've seen the thing freudo is talking about MANY times at work in the past few months... the Google redirect thing that occasionally brings up a page telling you download antivirus shit, and if you do it leads to horrible things... taking over your computer unless you buy some crap with your credit card.

Fortunately, the firewalls at work don't allow installing anything, but if you download it, it's quite a difficult one to get rid of.

[janie]

I have a friend who's the exact guy these things are aimed at: he bought a computer, never bothered taking even the minimal 1-hour computer-using course at the local library or read warning-type articles online, yet jumped right in to start selling stuff on Amazon. Naturally, he happily downloaded antivirus shit whenever directed to, and filled his computer to the brim with so much malarkey he couldn't even use it any more. I assume the guy who then fixed his computer for him tried to clue him in, but I wouldn't be surprised if he falls for it all over again.

And I have to think there are millions of people out there like my friend.

[leelee]

I have two family members exactly like that. Hiding the IE shortcut doesn't last forever, though.