@caldreamer wrote:
I experienced similar problem when reading news articles on YAHOO. Suddenly RED FLASHING LETTERS came on screen and said "your computer has been hacked and to call Microsoft at this phone number immediately".
Because I am not computer saavy...I called the phone number. They acted very professional but before I realized was happened they took control of my computer and installed RANSOM WEAR. They still pretended to be Microsoft technician and said it would cost $600 to fix problem.
At that point...I realized I was being scammed and told them I will not pay. They warned me that very bad things would happen if I didn't fix the problem immediately and they were correct.
I brought my brand new desktop computer to COMPUTER DOCTOR and he told you COMPUTER IS TOAST. He said you should have paid the $600.
I later contacted MICROSOFT technicians directly and was on the phone with them for 10 HOURS. They tried in vain and nobody could fix my computer.
That's terrible. Please share your story with others so people don't fall victim to this.
At my work, someone received a message that was spoofed to be from one of our lawyers with a file to look at. He opened the link and ransomware was installed on all our common drives. They did literally $1M in damages to our company. However we have a lot of backup drives, so after three weeks of working on it, it was resolved. We did not give the thieves any money.
Everyone should buy an external hard drive (like 1 TB from Seagate) and copy all their important files, photos, media, etc onto it. So if something does happen to your computer you have a backup of everything. Those of us who photograph items have many GB of data to protect. One of these gadgets is about $100 (in Canada), probably better price in USA.
C.
