Dear Wizard of 'OZ',
Recently I keep getting pop-ups saying my computer is affected by a
virus. I click on the pop-up and nothing seems to happen, sometimes, it
takes me to another webpage, trying to sell me something. How do I know
if they are real?
Signed,
Popped Out
Dear Popped
Those annoying popup windows with a warning that your computer is about
to shutdown, or that you just got a virus are not always true.
Well, unless you have a Norton anti-virus detector or some other device,
and the warning is from the company, you are the victim of a hoax..
Probably the first thing you should notice about a warning is the
request to "send this to everyone you know" or some variant of that
statement. This should raise a red flag that the warning is probably a
hoax. No real warning message from a credible source will tell you to
send this to everyone you know.
Next, look at what makes a successful hoax. There are two known factors that make a successful hoax, they are:
(1) technical sounding language.
(2) credibility by association.
If the warning uses the proper technical jargon, most individuals,
including technologically savvy individuals, tend to believe the warning
is real. For example, the Good Times hoax says that "...if the
program is not stopped, the computer's processor will be placed in an
nth-complexity infinite binary loop which can severely damage the
processor...". The first time you read this, it sounds like it might
be something real. With a little research, you find that there is no
such thing as an nth-complexity infinite binary loop and that processors
are designed to run loops for weeks at a time without damage.
When we say credibility by association we are referring to who sent the
warning. If the janitor at a large technological organization sends a
warning to someone outside of that organization, people on the outside
tend to believe the warning because the company should know about those
things. Even though the person sending the warning may not have a clue
what he is talking about, the prestige of the company backs the warning,
making it appear real. If a manager at the company sends the warning,
the message is doubly backed by the company's and the manager's
reputations.
Both of these items make it very difficult to claim a warning is a hoax
so you must do your homework to see if the claims are real and if the
person sending out the warning is a real person and is someone who would
know what they are talking about. You do need to be a little careful
verifying the person as the apparent author may be a real person who has
nothing to do with the hoax. If thousands of people start sending them
mail asking if the message is real, that essentially constitutes an
unintentional denial of service attack on that person. Check the
person's web site or the person's company web site to see if the hoax
has been responded to there.
Yrs,
The Wizard
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