Ctrl, Alt, Del

[Caro]

I don’t know if this has been brought up on here before but I just read a thread on twitter and thought it would be an interesting topic to bring up on here. It was about this lady who’s mother almost got scammed out of thousands because she suddenly got a locked blue screen on her computer with a phone number to call, which she did and basically ended with her being convinced to go out and buy gift cards in order to then give the scratch off info to the person on the phone. As someone who works in retail, we’re trained to spot these scams because there’s been a huge epidemic of them in the last couple years targeting people especially the elderly with all sorts of scare tactics but it’s crazy how many people are easily being tricked into giving private info and money by these scammers. And let’s not even start with all the annoying texting scams. I get those daily (Your package was not delivered by USPS due to wrong address on file blah blah blah) Of course they always go in the trash folder


Anyway, if for any reason you accidentally click on a spam link or you happen to get a blue screen that locks your computer a good way to get out of it is by hitting ctrl alt del and shutting it all down to restart. NEVER call the numbers or click on links on the screen or in texts/messages/emails. And please let your loved ones especially elderly loved ones know to watch out for these scams (there’s quite a lot of them besides the blue screen scam like AI faking a phone call from a loved one asking for money etc google for more info if interested)
Twitter thread

More info on how to force quit locked screen from google:
“Some of these pop-ups have code that make them hard to close, so if a pop-up is staying stubbornly open, you can force your Internet browser to close by hitting Ctrl + Alt + Delete and opening the Task Manager if you're using Windows, or Command + Option + Escape if you're on a Mac”

 

[wombat146]

Good advice Caro! It is suprising how many people will fall for these types of scams!

A few years ago my FB was hijacked/scammed with a message sent out to all of my friends saying that I was in some holiday resort on holidays but had lost my wallet and could you please send "me" some money to get home!!!! I didn't even realise until I got a phone call from my daughter asking how my 'holiday' was going!!!! hahahaa!! She was laughing as she asked me, knowing full well that I didn't even have that type of money to actually go on a holiday to begin with!!!!!!

Just recently I received an email from "Paypal" asking for account details as a payment had been blocked............. I looked at the email address to see where it had come from and it was from a robinsomethingsomething using gmail. lol! Normally my anitvirus/spammer will pick those type of emails up but it missed this one! and yes, I get those emails (in my spam folder) about parcels not being able to be delivered; that I have won this big prize; that I am going to be locked out of my Yahoo account; etc etc. The list goes on!!

 

[Jam-on-toast]

One can never be too careful! thanks for the reminder Caro...

The amount of spam emails I get is crazy... some claim to be from an elderly uncle who left me a couple million in his will, some suggest I need to update my card details to continue using ApplePay, some politely inform me my computer's been infected with a virus which allowed them to make a video recording of me indecently enjoying myself during one of my regular visits to a certain disreputable site... I also get regular emails from what looks like Netflix saying my account has been frozen due to unusual activity or
PayPal insisting my card has been rejected... One needs to be really vigilant these days!

 

[faerywings]

I never thought of using the Task Manager for that. Wish I knew and had been able to tell my parents. Not that it would have made much of a difference.
My parents got scammed out of thousands of dollars last month from a pop-up window scam. My dad fell for the "Call Windows Security" scam. He got a pop-up from "Windows" with a number to call- which he did and started that awful ball rolling quickly. My mom and dad (83 and 85 and not super computer literate) took out 10K in cash and fed it into a Bitcoin machine at a gas station.
The scammers hit every last trick- fear, isolation, protecting the family by not telling us- and did it in a matter of a couple of hours.

Now they are stressed out every time they log on to their computer. I'll give them this tip as one more thing they can do to protect themselves. Thanks sooo much for sharing, Caro ♥

 

[AZK]

I never thought of using the Task Manager for that. Wish I knew and had been able to tell my parents. Not that it would have made much of a difference.
My parents got scammed out of thousands of dollars last month from a pop-up window scam. My dad fell for the "Call Windows Security" scam. He got a pop-up from "Windows" with a number to call- which he did and started that awful ball rolling quickly. My mom and dad (83 and 85 and not super computer literate) took out 10K in cash and fed it into a Bitcoin machine at a gas station.
The scammers hit every last trick- fear, isolation, protecting the family by not telling us- and did it in a matter of a couple of hours.

Now they are stressed out every time they log on to their computer. I'll give them this tip as one more thing they can do to protect themselves. Thanks sooo much for sharing, Caro ♥

Oh, Chris, that's awful! I feel so bad for your parents. I'm personally very vigilant about being tricked into a scam and have been safe so far, but I know my sister's FB profile gets hacked every now and then.

Caro, thanks for the info! I use ctrl-alt-delete all the time if my computer is misbehaving, but it honestly never occurred to me that a problem could be scam-related.

 

[Caro]

Good advice Caro! It is suprising how many people will fall for these types of scams!

A few years ago my FB was hijacked/scammed with a message sent out to all of my friends saying that I was in some holiday resort on holidays but had lost my wallet and could you please send "me" some money to get home!!!! I didn't even realise until I got a phone call from my daughter asking how my 'holiday' was going!!!! hahahaa!! She was laughing as she asked me, knowing full well that I didn't even have that type of money to actually go on a holiday to begin with!!!!!!

Just recently I received an email from "Paypal" asking for account details as a payment had been blocked............. I looked at the email address to see where it had come from and it was from a robinsomethingsomething using gmail. lol! Normally my anitvirus/spammer will pick those type of emails up but it missed this one! and yes, I get those emails (in my spam folder) about parcels not being able to be delivered; that I have won this big prize; that I am going to be locked out of my Yahoo account; etc etc. The list goes on!!

Yep, I see my friends get hacked all the time on FB and IG. There's another scam on Instagram where someone pretending to be your friend will ask you to send you a code they send to your email or phone and if the person falls for it they end up locking you out of all your accounts with that code. Someone just used my daughter's photo to make an account on IG then started messaging her follower list to try this. Fortunately someone messaged her to ask if it was her cause it sounded funny to them. It's ridiculous how many ways there are to scam or hack people.

 

[Caro]

I never thought of using the Task Manager for that. Wish I knew and had been able to tell my parents. Not that it would have made much of a difference.
My parents got scammed out of thousands of dollars last month from a pop-up window scam. My dad fell for the "Call Windows Security" scam. He got a pop-up from "Windows" with a number to call- which he did and started that awful ball rolling quickly. My mom and dad (83 and 85 and not super computer literate) took out 10K in cash and fed it into a Bitcoin machine at a gas station.
The scammers hit every last trick- fear, isolation, protecting the family by not telling us- and did it in a matter of a couple of hours.

Now they are stressed out every time they log on to their computer. I'll give them this tip as one more thing they can do to protect themselves. Thanks sooo much for sharing, Caro ♥

Oh no! I'm so sorry this happened to your poor parents. I read something similar happening to another person replying to the twitter thread I linked. That whole bitcoin thing, and yes they'll hit them with the "do not tell anyone because they can be hurt" tactic so they don't try to ask for help from anyone they know. Sometimes they even have personal info like social security numbers to convince the person they're legit so they can be quite convincing. UGH it makes me so sad/mad that they target our loved ones like this.

 

[Caro]

Oh, Chris, that's awful! I feel so bad for your parents. I'm personally very vigilant about being tricked into a scam and have been safe so far, but I know my sister's FB profile gets hacked every now and then.

Caro, thanks for the info! I use ctrl-alt-delete all the time if my computer is misbehaving, but it honestly never occurred to me that a problem could be scam-related.

Yes, I knew about for years because sometimes a spam link on a video or something would pop up with a locked screen that would lock up my computer so I found out that's how you force quit. Plus it comes in handy every time my PSE starts acting up

 

[Caro]

One can never be too careful! thanks for the reminder Caro...

The amount of spam emails I get is crazy... some claim to be from an elderly uncle who left me a couple million in his will, some suggest I need to update my card details to continue using ApplePay, some politely inform me my computer's been infected with a virus which allowed them to make a video recording of me indecently enjoying myself during one of my regular visits to a certain disreputable site... I also get regular emails from what looks like Netflix saying my account has been frozen due to unusual activity or
PayPal insisting my card has been rejected... One needs to be really vigilant these days!

yes, soooo sooo many ways they try to scam you. I get them all. A good way to go about it is to NEVER reply, click or call any of the info in the emails, texts, messages. If for example your bank sends you an email saying something happened just click out of the email and call your bank directly from the back of your card or local branch. I never click on anything in any email even if they're legit because they're getting so good at faking these that the emails in the address bar can sometimes actually be legit emails and phone numbers to call in the emails can be legit phone numbers just spoofed to call another fake number. Almost always though, they'll have grammar or spelling mistakes that definitely mean it's fake.