Threat News

Warning: Recently many people have recieved telephone calls purporting to be from Microsoft and claiming that your computer is infected. Please hang up on any such caller as it is a scam. Microsoft do not make these calls and, even if you computer has an infection these people don't know about it. The caller will wish to take over control of your computer and will be very convincing. It is possible for them to access personal information unknown to you or place spyware onto your machine. They will ask you to pay a fee (usually in the region of £90.00) and may use your card details for illegal access to your money. Please do not fall for this scam.

Fake Antivirus Software. There are many fake anti virus programs on the internet. Many of these will appear suddenly on your screen announcing that you have multiple threats. If this happens do not click anything as this will allow the download to occur. It is best to simply switch off the computer at the source of supply. Do not shut the computer down in the normal way as this can also trigger the download. Once this fake software gets downloaded it can be very difficult to get rid of and it will prevent the use of the machine by claiming that every file you try to open is infected. The aim is to make you pay online but again as above your card details may be used to obtain other money. At the very best it may stop the warnings but it may not. Also it may open back doors on your computer so allow the perpetrators access to your machine. If you have this infection stop using your machine and contact me.

Fake Emails. There are too many undesirable emails for me to list. As a general rule if you don't know the sender delete it. Banks never request information by email , the same goes for credit card companies and PayPal. Parcel delivery services do not send emails about failure to deliver unless requested specifically to do so. It is most important that you avoid clicking links on unsolicited emails unless they are sent by a reliable company.

False Websites. There are some websites which are clones of legitimate sites, usually you are redirected to these sites by infections already on your computer or by emails. These are not always easy to avoid but if you are in doubt then check it out. Reading the domain address at the top of your browser will give some indication. You should note that the last part of a web address refers to the domain location of the site. i.e www.fred.burwaycomputers.co.uk is a legitimate subdomain of burwaycomputers.co.uk. but www.burwaycomputers.fred.co.uk is a subdomain of fred.co.uk and has nothing to do with us. www.paypal.com/accounts would be genuine but www.paypal.clone.com/accounts would be fake. If you are thinking of spending money online with a website you have never heard of you can check information about the domain by typing "whois domain name " into google. Finally don't download anything from any website unless it has been personally recommended by a trustworthy source.

We hope that these warnings help to keep you safe from scams, however there are so many different ways of getting caught on the net, that we know we have only scratched the surface. If you have any specific worries please call us on 01694 240024.

Coming soon: We will be putting together a pdf document about internet safety and avoiding scams and viruses. We hope to have this available for dowload in early April 2012.