Don’t be fooled by antivirus software

There are many bogus antivirus software viruses, email and phone scams doing the rounds at the moment and many computer users are being fooled by them, which has cost them money, not to mention the trauma that goes with it. 

If you get a window appearing on your screen saying that you have viruses or you are infected with malicious threats and is headed "Security Tools” or “Security Shield" or something similar, DO NOT CLICK ON THE WINDOW. Instead, hold your finger on the power button and force shut down your computer and then restart it. 

Bogus offers

The latest one is called "MyDisk" and tells you that your hard drive is full and out of memory or that your memory usage is high. This is also a virus and has recently been released and if you don't have eScan as your antivirus software, you may have some difficulty deleting this nasty virus. These viruses play on your fear and lack of knowledge and offer you a way to clean your computer of these so called viruses and ask for your credit card number to pay for the software to scan your PC to remove the viruses that aren't there! 

These types of viruses are not viruses when they appear on your screen as they come in usually as a programme file with web pages but as soon as you click on the screen, even if it is to close the window, it activates the programme and becomes a virus. It then disables your antivirus software and allows other viruses in that perform other functions. It also disables many of the Windows features and tools, which prevents you from working on the computer to remove the virus. Hence, it is extremely important not to do anything but to power off your computer. When you turn it back on again after following these instructions you should find that the window is no longer there and you are safe to continue using your computer. The good news is that if you are unlucky enough to be infected with one of these viruses, we can remove them without losing any of your files.

Email scams

There are also many emails going around, which look like they have been sent by the company they are supposedly meant to represent. Some of these emails are supposedly from Kiwi Bank, Inland Revenue, NZLTA, PayPal and Trademe, which are just a few that you need to be aware of. These email scams say that you are owed something like $50 and ask for your credit card number so they can credit your card. However, that's not what they do; instead they debit your card for a large amount of money.

No respectable company or organisation will ask for your credit card number to reimburse you as this method is unorthodox. Whatever you do, do not give out your credit card number in these circumstances.

Antivirus software needed

Viruses come in many different types and perform different functions. Therefore it is important to have good antivirus software and unfortunately most antivirus software is relatively ineffective as it cannot detect dormant viruses, which is how viruses are predominantly sent. eScan is the only brand that has the patented technology to detect dormant viruses, which is why we strongly recommend it to all computer users. There are versions for all the main operating systems such as Windows, Linux and Apple Mac. 

If you would like more information on how to handle the viruses describe in the above or on eScan, please contact Richard at Computers Plus Ltd, Shop 13, 7 Wood Street, Mangawhai Heads or phone (09) 431 3010.