Windows Users Targets in New Virus Scam

Posted on December 11th, 2009

A new threat to PCs has emerged: Virus software that was designed to dupe prospective users into believing that Microsoft is endorsing their “scamware” has been found on Windows computers.

A rogue product called DefenceLab redirects infected PCs to Microsoft’s Support portal, but modifies the web page content so as to appear as if Microsoft is endorsing the software. The software conducts a fake scan and bogus Windows Security Center alert, then asks the user to pay for a full version of the supposed clean-up utility.

Surfers visiting the web page on the Windows Support site referenced in the scareware from a virus-free PC will get a 404 ‘page not found’ message. Hacked PC victims will see what appears to be an endorsement by Microsoft.

Screenshots of the virus sofware can be found here.

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