Due to the ongoing Cantina painting, there will be no meeting this Friday Sept 19th. I don’t have a new date yet.
But that doesn’t mean I don’t love all of you. So to tide you over until the next meeting I’ll share with you some of the things I’ve run into while helping people here in the park in the last few weeks.
Recently, I’ve had to clean up a few PCs where the owner (people here in the park) gets a call from a stranger saying something like there’s something wrong with your PC. You are asked to go to a website and download a program. This program you download gives the caller COMPLETE control over your PC. And you are showed a screen with all sorts of fancy error messages. “See how bad it is?” the caller says.
So this guy (or girl usually with an Indian sounding accent) asks you for a credit card number to “Buy the software” and “make the corrections”. Hmmm. Sounds kinda fishy right? Well it is.
Firstly, you are in trouble the second you download that software and install it. The damage is done. Turn off your PC and call me.
Second, if you actually GIVE the person the CC number there is no reason to think that will be the end of it. Case in point: A couple of weeks ago I visited a lady in downtown Arcadia (at the recommendation of a Village person) and yep, this happened to her. But in this case, the called said it would cost “fourteen ninety nine” to fix. 
This nice lady thought “Hey, $14.99 isn’t so bad.” But when she got a call from the CC company she was told a charge of $1499.00 was on her bill. Of course she canceled it and had to spend hours fixing the mess.
So what can you learn here?
- If someone calls you and says your PC has been hacked the call is bogus.
Hang up. - If someone calls and ask you to turn on your PC the call is bogus.
Hang up. (this happened to Cindy this morning!!!) - If someone calls and says they are from Windows Technical Support the call is bogus. There is no such thing and certainly not affiliated with Microsoft. Hang up.
Also, in the last 6 weeks or so I have helped 6-8 people with this a similar set of problems. Popups, Internet not Working, Browser acting funny. There is a set of Malware out there that gets onto your PC that is causing these problems. AND I’VE SEEN IT A LOT. If you want to look yourself go to Start > Control Panel > Programs and Features and see if there is a program in there called. PC Optimizer. That is a flag to give me a call. I’m so good at this stuff now I can get it out in 30 minutes.
I’m still noodling on the right way to show how people in the park can avoid installing bad software. It’s tricky to show – but I think I can do it. It will be a MUST ATTEND class in the winter.
Lastly, the classes this winter are going to be a lot more fun. Honest. 😉 We’ll be having a basic Word Processing and Spreadsheets class. Whoo hoo!!! More info will be forthcoming but the Word Processing class will be meant to help you compose and print a simple letter with some fun fonts and formatting. The Spreadsheet class will show you you how to build a simple list calculator, calculate an auto payment, and maybe a simple household budget if we have time.
“But Steve, I don’t have (can’t afford) Microsoft Office!”
No worries. There is free software out there which is as good as Office in every way. Feel free to download LibreOffice here.
That’s it! See you all soon!!!!
Steve