Not Your AVG Attack

AVG is an excellent antivirus program for your computer – their free version is often more effective than Norton or McAfee.

BUT –and this is important – They do not solicit!

A couple days ago, I was surfing the web when I got a pop-up that warned that AVG had discovered a Trojan on my computer.  It had a button to click to correct the problem, and without thinking ( I used to run AVG Free, but had uninstalled it several months ago) I clicked on it.

It then installed what it said was AVG 2011, and demanded payment to activate the program.  I closed it, but continuous pop-ups blocked all attempts to remove it.  For example, I could access Control Panel, but it blocked access to Add/Remove Programs. 

I was eventually able to run Malwarebytes, and after rebooting I was able to find and remove a file labeled AVG.  I have had no further problems, but the consensus on an on-line chat room I frequent was that I got off lucky – at least two responders who got the same thing had to format their hard drives and reinstall Windows!

One of the folks who responded included a link to the  Phony AVG Story  from a website called  F-Secure, which includes screen shots of the real and the phony AVG screens.

Bottom line – If you get a pop-up from AVG, it is a fake that is trying to steal your credit card information, and it could crash your computer!  DO NOT click on the button!  Close it  before it damages your computer, then run whatever antivirus and malware program you have loaded – a good one to run would be AVG.