phishing scams

Rio James recently got an email thanking him for payment and comes with a statement attached. But he never made such a payment. He knew right away that it was a phishing scam. Leo agrees, saying that the idea is to get him to open an attached PDF File that has been corrupted with a worm or virus. In many cases, it's harmless if the software and Windows are updated. If not, then it can take over a machine. The whole idea is to play on fear and greed, even curiosity, and get him to click on the link without thinking. So RJ was wise not to open it. 

Daisy is a teacher, who is now doing distance learning with her kids and she's having issues logging into her district Gmail account. She gets a google sign-in page that opens when she goes to Google Hangouts. She now can't get into her account. Leo suspects that is a phony phishing scam that has gotten her credentials and then locked her out. Leo suggests contacting the district IT office and have the password reset and 2-factor authentication set up so that it won't happen again. 

Roger got an invoice in email and saw that it had a lot of similar details as his. Leo says chances are it came as part of a typo that misaddressed it. Nothing to really worry about. Leo gets wrong emails all the time. But there is a scam out there where people will send invoices, hoping that someone will automatically pay the invoice without paying attention. But it's easy to verify by looking at the email. Where was it actually addressed to?

William's computer was hacked and he knows who did it. He was the victim of a phishing scam that nabbed him after he clicked on an email link. Leo says William should change all his passwords, wipe his hard drive and start over. But call the police first. If you can prove the information, call the police and then bring the computer to them. 

Bernie is having issues logging into Facebook. He gets a popup that says he needs to give them some information, including a credit card number. Leo says that's definitely not Facebook. Facebook will ask for identification from time to time, especially if your account has been compromised, or you've lost access to your account, but Leo says to never do that with a credit card. Use other options like a utility bill. Here's some information - https://www.facebook.com/help/contact/183000765122339. Leo says it's likely a scam.

Robert got bit by a phishing scam about being a workshop presenter. He clicked on a link to download an attachment and nothing happened. He realized what he had done and disconnected his desktop. Now he thinks he needs to reinstall? Leo says Nuke from orbit. Do not install from in-place. He should want to back up data, wipe the hard drive, and then reinstall Windows from a known, good source. But he should make sure to know if he actually has malware. If he has a WInMail.dat file attachment, that's from Microsoft and older Outlooks use it. 

Jim got an email from Google that stated he had put in a request to terminate his account, which is something he never asked for. Leo suspects this is a phishing attempt. He should hover over the URL for the link they offer to contact them and see if it's legit. Chances are, it isn't.

Justin's mother-in-law has a MacBook Pro that has ransomware on it. She just gets a blue screen. Leo says that Macs don't get blue screens, they kernel panic. It's likely an exploit in Javascript that is locking up her cursor to make her think the computer is frozen. She can press ALT + TAB to get out of the browser and she'll probably be fine. Then, she should turn off Javascript. Leo says it will not happen after that.

John's friend got bit by the popup that said she had a virus and then when she called "Microsoft support" they wanted $300 to fix it. Leo says it's a phishing scam. And once you give someone access to your computer, not only will they not fix anything, but they make the infection even worse by installing other malware. The only way forward now is to backup the data, format the hard drive, and then reinstall Windows.