Well that sucked

Hey gang:

So, last week, all was well in the casa. I was going into my finals, which ran from Thursday through Saturday. My finals were nearly complete, just some last minute tweaks to the two finals. I was attending a horror convention on Saturday in Indianapolis, so everything seemed to be in place to have my work done, submitted, and haul ass to Indy for some monster kid fun. And then it happened.

I sat down on my pc to open up my projects. Hot cup of coffee in hand, I opened the normal stuff; email, Twitter, FB. I checked my email, and went onto Twitter, and started to write my usual greeting, when my computer locked up on me. My screen twitched, went black, and then went to a screen with the most horrifying background I have ever seen.

The screen was the thing nightmares are made of. A white screen with the Interpol logo in the background, Department of Defense, FBI, Homeland Security, the whole shebang. A notice stating that my pc had been locked and temporarily seized by the U.S. Government, along with government articles outlining what I was "guilty" of, including viewing child pornography, illegally downloading documents, being in possession of illegally downloaded software, uploading mass spamming software, etc.

I don't mind telling you I nearly shit myself when I saw this. I will state for the record that I did none of these things at all. In case you have not heard of this yet, it's a scare virus. This is a particularly nasty virus that to date has not been fixed. The virus locks you out of your pc completely. Not just the internet, but the whole pc becomes a very expensive paperweight instantly. I called a few buddies that work in the IT field, and they all told me I was screwed until I took it to a place to have the virus removed.

A trip to my local Geek Squad was in order, so I reluctantly took it there. I was in full on panic mode, mainly since my finals were ALL on that pc. I'm militant about saving my work to my external after I complete the work, but this one time I had not. I was told they could probably fix it (not what I wanted to hear), and I would be without the pc for three to seven days. This caused me to call everyone short of Santa Claus trying to get my finals worked out with my professors, which turned out pretty well in my favor. Five days, and $250.00 later, my pc is back. The Geek Squad guys were able to save everything on my pc, and no permanent damage was done to any programs. I got lucky, ironically, since they told me most people have to have the pc set back to original factory standards, meaning all programs installed were lost, so I dodged a bullet there (I have a lot of programs, including all Adobe software, which is super expensive).
The end state of this is to give you all a fair heads up about this virus. It's called the FBI virus, and it is going around, and has been for some time. If you get this virus, take it to a store and get it removed. It was more than a mere inconvenience, it cost me money and almost cost me grades as well. I hope none of you ever have this happen to you. See you online.

ZJ

Also, I forgot to mention that the virus is a 100% scam. The purpose of this virus is to make people think they have done illegal activity of the worst kind on their computers. Since most people get really nervous about the threat of even being accused of crimes, the scammers know that people might not be inclined to take it to a store and tell them that the pc was locked down for cyber crimes, especially the child porn stuff, the worst of the worst. These people are scum, and I would love nothing more than to see these people get thrown in prison for a very long time. The scam is obvious, but is set up in such a way to make people go buy a $300 card to "pay" the government to unlock your pc. I posted this to make you all aware of this. If this happens to any of you, do NOT click on anything on the screen. Shut it off, take it to a repair center, and have it fixed.

ZJ

Thanks for the heads up on this. I'm sorry to hear that you got hit with a particularly nasty virus. I'm not asking the next question to be judgmental but did it get past your antivirus? If so, which one are you using? I'm "unpaid" tech support for about a dozen friends and the information may help someone else avoid the same "fun" that you had. Thanks,

Steve

Thanks, I was running Norton, full version, set up to run a full system scan every 12 hours, and runs quick scans every few minutes while computer is idle. I of course brought this up with the techs, and they said it does not matter which antivirus you run, the hackers fins ways around it. Makes sense, really, since so much money and time goes into counter hacking technology to try and keep up with the new hacker methods. Thanks again.

ZJ

Holy crap, that sucks! I'm glad they were able to save your files. Thanks for the heads up.

what if you were guilty of most of that stuff, I think I have a friend that looks at some fucked up shit and I worry about him.

The point of this virus is to scare the hell out of the population into thinking they have either purposely, or accidentally, viewed illegal content, or took part in illegal activity. It works somewhat like a horoscope in essence. It uses generalized activity to make you immediately think you have doe something wrong. I can promise that I have done none of these things listed, but the mere threat of accusation is enough to make most people very concerned, especially when you see things like FBI, and so on popping up on your screen. My best friend happens to be a federal officer, so we spoke for some time about this. This is not how the FBI or any other government agency conducts crackdowns or raids on potential cyber criminals. They don't lock up your pc, they come knock on your door and arrest you and seize your equipment. These criminals know how to spook people. While I was in line with my pc, there were three other people in the line with the exact same issue, including what I would guess was a 70 year old gentleman who uses his pc to talk to his family and get and send emails. It's a random attack on innocent people.

Sly Version 2.0hhhhh wrote:

what if you were guilty of most of that stuff, I think I have a friend that looks at some fucked up shit and I worry about him.

Isn't that kinda the point of the "world wide web"?

To view fucked up shit from all over the world that's pretty much outlawed in this country.

And to download music right?..........wait isn't that illeg.........oh never mind.

That's how these hackers get away with a lot of these things.

Shit i can't even turn my laptop on without offending some busy body somewhere.

But still, good on ya for putting the word out there John.

Thanks man.

ZJ

I seen this about 6 months ago on a friends lap top and it was watching them !

Any idea where/how you picked it up?

No clue. The techs said it could have been there for days or months even.

ZJ