This variant popped up in late September, but is gaining traction as injected websites begin drifting to the top of search engine results.

How Do You Get Infected?

These fake alert infections typically come into your computer through internet web searches on search engines like Google, Yahoo, and Bing.

The makers of these fake-alert infections create thousands of websites with valuable content on subjects they can easily rank in the top 10 results of popular web searches.

After these sites climb to an appropriate level, click-jacking code is inserted that will infect unprotected computers as soon as they visit the page – without warning.

Typically the only symptom of impending infection is a pop-up that warns you that your computer is infected (when it is in fact not).

How Do Keep My Computer Safe?

The best way to keep your computer safe is to have good virus protection software installed on your computer.

While technicians disagree to a degree on which program is the best to use, my opinion (based on HUNDREDS of infected PCs that Schrock Innovations has repaired) is that free antivirus like AVG is a problem waiting to happen.

I recommend Symantec’s Norton 360 software. It offers some of the best protection on the market while also featuring the most user-friendly interface.

Those who are have had bad experiences with Norton in th past because it slowed dow their computers should note that the newer versions are MUCH lighter than the older versions (although any antivirus software will slow down your computer).

Typically these take the form of phone calls about trends or marketing ideas, but York Computer Repair is a whole different story.

Yesterday I received an unexpected thank you letter (yes the postal mail kind) from York Computer Repair’s Owner, Walter Oakhem. Here is what he wrote:

Thank you for all of the help you have given me with starting York Computer Repair.

I especially appreciate the information and advice you have provided, and the contacts you have shared with me. Your assistance has been invaluable to me during this process. I just wanted to say an extra thank you for your mentoring and kindness.

Again, thank you so much. I greatly appreciate your generosity.

What Did I Do to Deserve Such Kind Words?

I have never really talked about Walt, his company, or what I have done to help him get things rolling in York, PA. Even my employees don’t know the details of what we discussed. In one of our calls Walt suggested I document our conversations because he felt other computer repair company owners might benefit from them.

I am going to preface this by stating that no consultant, no home study course, and no business model can bring you success unless you are willing to implement it.

From day one, Walt has had a flame of passion that I have seen in few others over the past few years. While this post will name off some of the suggestions I gave to Walt, by no means am I trying to take any portion of the credit for his work. Anyone can talk, but only an entrepreneur can transform talk into results like Walt has in Pennsylvania.

The Meat & Potatoes of Three Phone Calls

Over the course of our three phone calls we covered topics raging from starting up to scaling to a retail location and everything in between. Walt and I discussed:

• The absolute NEED for a sales model (and how easy it is to make one)
• How to target a small niche in your marketplace and expand outward from there
• Yellow Pages advertising techniques that are proven to bring in hundreds of new customers each month
• How to build an inventory of repair components for next to nothing
• How to hire employees as inexpensively as possible in the first few months
• How to value your time and get your customers to pay a reasonable price for it
• Every reason you should NEVER try to be a low-cost leader
• The need for a work flow management system and where you can get one specifically designed for computer repair shops
• How you can create brands for your physical products and service products and why it is a VITAL step than is often skipped causing others to fail
• Who the key low-cost hardware providers are and how to do business with them (if you think NewEgg is your best value, think again)
• The need to continually remind your customers how wise they are to choose to do business with you

Walt paid me my normal $200 an hour rate over the course of three calls. With the information he had, he was able to accelerate the growth of his new operation, and had the best month of his company’s history in June.

How Can Just Talking Help a PC Repair Business?

Walt first heard about me and Schrock Innovations from a podcast I did with PodNutz about starting a computer repair shop. In that podcast I stressed that most PC repair technicians try to penetrate a market as a low cost leader. That approach dooms them to failure. I spoke about the need to charge a fair price for your service, not just the hardware you are selling.

Walt heard that podcast and called me for followup. Because of our three phone conversations his PC repair shop is rapidly growing. His Q4 marketing plan looks like a home run, and even if it under performs his larger population base in PA will make it a bigger success than the 162 new customers Schrock gets every month by following that same model.

I have made a lot of mistakes, learned form them, and modified my techniques to gain the best return on my efforts. It is entirely true that another person can learn the same lessons I did the same way I learned them.

However, it is also true that if a person like me existed 10 years ago when I started Schrock Innovations we would have cut 5 years off our growth curve, had an easier time doing it, and would have earned tens of thousands of dollars more.

Does Your PC Repair Shop Need Some Fresh Insights?

In the coming weeks I will be blogging about the bullet points I covered with Walt. Subscribe to my RSS feed to make sure you don’t miss any of the topics. If you need more immediate or involved assistance give me a call at 402-212-5393 and let me know what challenge you are facing. I might be able to give you the piece of advice you have been missing!

Over the past few months fake-alert malware infections have become more sophisticated at preventing the installation of common security products like MalwareBytes, AdAware, and Spybot S&D.

Fake Alert infections are those pesky pop-ups that tell your customer that their computer is infected with a ton of nastiness, when in fact the only infection is the fake-alert its self.  Typically these programs ask consumers to pay between $25 and $100 to activate the software (stopping the popups).  Unfortunately this also leaves the computer infected and under the control of the malware writer.

The Early Days of Fake Alert Infections

In early 2009 removing these infections because a profit center for many computer repair shops.  Simply rebooting in Safe Mode, installing a free scanning program, and removing the infection was all that was needed to earn an hour of labor and seed a security software sale.

As the year progressed however, these infections became more advanced.  Most of today’s fake alert infections run in both regular and safe mode, and will actively thwart any installation of common security or scanning software.

Fake Alert Infections are Smart, but not too Smart

Although the fake alert infections are getting smarter, they are still only programmed with a fixed set of “detections” designed to kill the process of installing security software. Much like the early days of anti-virus software, fake alert infections do not scan for types of activity – they scan for specific files, processes, and events.

In my service center we use MalwareBytes to remove many infections.  In our opinion it is much more thorough than Spybot and it doesn’t have all of the annoying extras like the resident shield that complicate advanced malware removal.

There are some specific steps you can take to make certain that you have the tools in your shop, car, or briefcase to thwart any fake alert infection, as long as you come prepared.

How To Defeat Fake Alert Defenses

1. First, you are going to need a blank CD.  Your flash drive won’t work for this procedure because newer fake alert infections prevent the installation of new storage devices.  When you plug in your drive, the infection will block its installation.
2. Next, download a copy of MalwareBytes and save it on your desktop.  Rename the installer to some name other than its default.  Many of the newer infections will scan for the na,e of the installer and kill it when it is found.
3. After you have renamed the MalwareBytes installer, you need to download the latest MalwareBytes detections.  It is common practice for infections to block access to update servers, so having the latest detections on hand is essential to a complete removal.
4. Now burn the files to your CD and reboot the infected computer into Safe Mode (this is more a safety step than anything else – Safe Mode is the safest possible environment for removing infections) and disconnect its internet connection.
5. Install MalwareBytes on the infected computer from your CD.  After the installation completes you will most likely receive an error message.  That is the infection killing the MalwareBytes updater.
6. Double click on the detections file you downloaded to install it.  Disregard any error messages.
7. Re-launch MalwareBytes and check that the detections date is the current date under the Update tab.
8. Run a Quick Scan – not a thorough scan.  Some infections will detect a scan in progress after some time and kill it.  GO for the quick scan and after it finds a few infections, stop the scan clean the results, reboot and repeat.  Once your Quick Scan comes back clean, do a thorough one afterward to ensure a complete removal

Preventing Reinfection – IMPORTANT

We are in a service business, so it is important to realize that even though we have removed the infections that our customer will not be very happy with us if they get reinfected again tomorrow.  In fact, they will probably accuse you of not doing your job the first time!

Most fake alert infections come from the following:

• Pornographic Websites
• Infected Torrents
• Free *anything* websites
• Websites about music lyrics
• Search Engines displaying infected websites within results for currently hot topics

The bottom line is that if your customer got infected once, it is because of their Internet habits.  That means they will get infected again.

I strongly recommend to all of my customers that they install Norton 360 after recovering from a fake alert infection.

There is honest debate among technicians about which anti-virus software is better.  There is a valid argument that can be made that AVG is better because it is free.  In my service center we warranty our customers against reinfection when we remove malware *if* they install Norton 360.

We use it because things don’t bounce back under warranty with infections.  I can honestly say that using AVG people – especially high risk users – get reinfected constantly.

This is a SERVICE industry, so I would rather recommend a product that I know is going to work rather than get a high five for saving my customer some money up front so they can pay me again in the future.

What are your opinions on preventing reinfection?

Family Member : “No, the pointer moves a little bit when I move the mouse, but I can’t get the pointer to go any further to the right of the screen”.

Now I’m thinking they must have one of those old ball mice and it’s probably clogged with dirt. But their next statement really threw me off.

Family Member : “My mouse is the whole way to the right of my desk and I don’t have any more room to move the mouse”.

At this point I’m confused and trying to picturing what on Earth they could be talking about. I thought to myself, “surely they know they can pick up the mouse and move it back to the middle of the mouse pad?” No, they couldn’t be that dumb. I proceeded to ask “can you pick up your mouse and place it in the middle of your mouse pad?”

Family Member : ” Yes I can……the pointer moved a little bit……. Ahhh yes, now I can move the mouse around again.”

I didn’t know whether to laugh or tell them not to touch the computer again.

Walt from York Computer Repair in York, PA emailed in this story.

We all love our customers, but sometimes their problems with computers can make even the most serious technician crack a grin.

Email us your story and we will feature it here!