Month: October 2013

Fake updates are bad for you

Posted on by steve

Fake updates. More and more I am seeing computers infected with software installed by fake updates. You are browsing the Internet and suddenly you are on an official looking page saying you need to update your Flash Player or your Chrome or Firefox browser. If you do the update several really annoying programs are installed that then modify your browser so you get sent to places that install even more of this crap.

The best thing to do is never do an update from something that shows up in your browser. Chrome and Firefox update automatically in the background with little intervention from the user. Flash will notify you with a popup by the clock that you need an update and current versions can be set to also automatically update without user intervention.

Here is an article on the ZD Net site talking about the same thing and showing some images. Go check it out for additional info.

http://www.zdnet.com/fake-chrome-adobe-flash-updates-7000022123/

Email scams and the Affordable Care Act.

Posted on by steve

So yeah, the Affordable Care Act gets implemented and within days emails start getting sent out either being for it or against it and providing links to sites that support these views. Also, emails for surveys are getting sent out, again, both for and against. Unsurprisingly most of these emails are fake and the links go to the usual sites that install malware on your computers.

These emails make use of the passions people are feeling now. It’s basically an email version of “Like this if you hate/love Obama care!” and in the heat of the moment passion people are going to click those links …… and then be infected.

As always, don’t click limks in emails people. 🙂