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Think the Cold War is over? If you’ve been the victim of one of the “fake antivirus” scams, think again. This is the error message you get that says something like “Antivirus 2011 reports you have 328 virus infections on your PC!”. It then says the only way to clean these infections is by submitting your credit card information and buying the software.

Tell me you didn’t do that, please!

Usually, a quick scan with Malwarebytes (from Malwarebytes.org) cleaned this up. Then today, I saw this news item:
“On June 23, a network of web sites that were distributing fake antivirus software for Windows PCs and Macs suddenly went offline when the head of the company that processed payments for the group was busted.

The effect on the fake-AV industry was dramatic, according to Enigma Software Group:

Aside from the FBI cracking down on international “scareware” rings in 12 countries, Russian police arrested Pavel Vrublevsky, co-founder of Chrono­Pay, Russia’s biggest processor of online payments and a lead player in several fake AV scams. The combination of these two events [led] to a dramatic decline in fake anti-spyware and anti-virus software. On our end, we’ve seen a drastic drop in scan logs from new users, support logs, detections, and support tickets from new customers. Basically, we’ve witnessed a 60% decline in new fake AVs, scareware, and rogue anti-virus incidents.”

So, we took down the Berlin Wall, and turned our former enemies into entrepreneuers. Unfortunately, we forgot to give them a sense of ethics as well. And for now, we have a respite from these attacks, but it won’t be long before a new gang takes over this lucrative, but illegal, activity.