McAfee scam email aims at your credentials

This email fraud is a classic example of phishing that involves messages that lead the user to a malicious page, which repeats the design of a simple login site. Sure, frauds related to email messages from strangers involve different tactics, but this one also appears. McAfee scam email mimics the regular notification from the vendor regarding account details or the users’ licenses. It may be an offer to get a free license for 1 year (or prolong your current one), a message that you should approve certain changes to McAfee policies, or prolong the license as it expires soon. At least these words already make the message untrustworthy, as real messages never contain something like this. Is there a Mcafee scam email 2023 going around in cybersecurity?

At the email bottom, or in the exact text, there is a link or a button that you can click on to get the details. Regardless of the bait, it will throw you to a phishing page – the one that copies the McAfee login page or a scam survey site. The former is more likely when this link is in a scary message, the latter – in a gifting one. Does Mcafee send emails?

The login page has only 2 states – the default one and the “wrong login/password” sign underneath the fields for login credentials. Regardless of what you type there, the information will be transferred to crooks who can manage your account after that. Alternatively, from the phishing page that aims at your credentials, the site may contain a download button. It can download and install a thing you’d never get willingly. Adware or rogue apps are the most often cases in this case.

Pseudo-giveaway that promises you a gift will likely ask you for your personal information. Shady persons on the Darknet are willing to pay a lot for a database of users’ information. The pack of name/surname/physical address/email address/system information et cetera gives a lot of advantages for other scams.

Rarely, the message may contain the attached file, and the text offers you to open it instead of following the link. In this file, you’re supposed to see details about the changes in the terms or other stuff they used as a disguise for a letter. In fact, this attachment (often a .docx or .xlsx document) contains a virus.

How dangerous is the McAfee scam email 2023?

Main thing you’re risking when following the instructions in a scam fake email addressis your account credentials and your personal information. The latter may not look so scary to you, as you share a lot of information with different services online. However, they usually keep them in secret, as GDPR rules force them to. Meanwhile, crooks who obtain your personal information through phishing never pay attention to rules or laws. As I mentioned, this information will likely be packed into a database and sold on the Darknet. And the next owners of this data will hardly be benevolent.

Credentials from your account, on the other hand, fit two roles simultaneously. Having your McAfee account means being able to steal your license key, if the one is present. Afterward, your key will likely activate a cracked copy of this software. Alternatively, it will be sold for a penny somewhere on the Internet – at a way lower price than you paid for it. If your license supposes its usage on several computers, be ready to meet the squatters. Another role for the stolen credentials is adding them to a database of leaked passwords and logins. Such information packs are used in brute force attacks, and the more passwords are here, the bigger is the chance of success.

Malware injection through the attachment is the problem of a different grade. While identity theft or account hacking is not an instant action, malware starts actions immediately after the launch. Fake email address phishing, like McAfee email scams, has become the bread and butter for malware distributors over the last year. It is dangerous for both single users and corporations, as the human factor is exploitable. In such a form, you can get any malware – but the most common things are stealers, spyware and ransomware. Sometimes, they arrive individually, resulting in compromised accounts and ciphered data. Not the very pleasant consequences, ain’t they?

How to protect yourself from McAfee email scams? How to Stop Mcafee Spam Emails?

The positive about most email scams is that they can easily be mitigated by a simple attentiveness. Once receives a suspicious email, the user should pay attention to a couple of things in its body and header. Even the most sophisticated fakes will contain elements that cannot be the same as in the original email. Less complicated things usually have various other signs that will help you to uncover the fraud. So, Mcafee scam emails, how to stop?

Typos and grammatical errors

Despite the availability of online spell checkers, crooks still refuse to use them, making a lot of mistakes in their letters. Poor English, missed punctuation marks, bad design – all this cannot be met in an official email. Their presence points to the fake origin of such a letter.

Link address

Genuine messages may contain links to their website – for instructions, for example. However, they always belong to the original sender’s domain (mcafee.com for the genuine McAfee email message case). If you see the link to a dubious page, like 193d9haodcnaqda127.weebly.com, or a short link, that is the reason to avoid clicking it. Official mailing never contains links to external sites and never applies using short links.

Sender’s email address

There are official email addresses companies use for mailing or conversations. They are often listed on their website. Receiving a letter that pretends to be sent by McAfee support, but the sender is mikey19137@aol.com does not look trustworthy. In complicated situations, crooks may try to use email addresses that look related to the sender. That’s why it is better to review the contacts on the website. For McAfee, those are the following:

Strange offers and unusual notifications

Giveaways, quizzes, or notifications about account blocking are not typical for any company. They can mail you when there are certain problems with your account to be solved, but you would likely be aware of them. On the other hand, offering to share personal information in exchange for a prolonged license is never a real case. In conjunction with the symptoms we mentioned above, it will point to the fact that this message is fake.

Is it possible to avoid email spam in the future?

The appearance of email spam in your inbox does not mean any bad things happened. Crooks often purchase databases with random email addresses, flooding them to bait someone into fraud. If you neither respond nor follow the link, they will delete you from their list sooner or later. However, any activity (i.e., replies or clicks on the link) shows them that your account is active and was baited into a scam. Spam researchers state that any response to a fraudulent email causes a rapid increase in other fraudulent emails.

Several tips can help you get less spam and easily distinguish between genuine and fake ones. First, use a separate email for registrations on sites and events you are not confident about. Some sites are not so worried about their image and happily sell the databases with their client information to third parties. The latter is not always malicious, but exposure is unpleasant for your “main” email address. This draft email will act as a shield that will take all suspicious emails on its part. Meanwhile, you will be sure about emails in your personal or work inbox.

Another tip is related to reporting the suspicious emails. Yes, most mailing services use special anti-spam engines that control most spam flow. However, perfection has no limits – and sometimes you may see Mcafee phishing emails in your inbox. Reporting such a tricky mail is easy: all you have to do is click the button with three dots on that message and press “Report Spam”.

The post What Is McAfee Scam Email? Tips for Protection from McAfee Email Scam in 2023 appeared first on Gridinsoft Blog.

What are McAfee Popups? Is It McAfee Scam?

McAfee popup notifications can be divided into two types: legitimate ones, which are sent by a browser extension, and fake ones, which are sent by adware installed on the system. But how to stop McAfee pop-ups on Chrome? Suppose you have deliberately installed a McAfee browser extension. In that case, it is expected that you will see popup notifications from it. On the other hand, if you have no McAfee installed as the app or the browser extension in Chrome, these are probably fake McAfee popups. Next, we’ll figure out how to disable McAfee popups in Chrome and solve the problem of fake notifications.

How to Stop McAfee Popups on Chrome?

You can use Incognito mode in Chrome, temporarily removing the pop-up notifications from McAfee. However, if you need to block them completely, you can do so in Chrome’s notification settings. Alternatively, you can restore Chrome’s default settings. However, if you need to keep all your saved data and browser settings, you can use one of the following methods to understand how to get rid of McAfee popups on your computer.

Deny notifications from McAfee

How to get rid of McAfee popups on the computer? You can block push notifications from any site in Chrome, including the McAfee site. This is the most straightforward action you can take to hide all McAfee pop-up notifications.

Click the three vertical dots, then “Settings“.

Click Privacy & Security > Site Settings.

Select the “Notifications” option.

Select “Don’t allow to send notifications”.

Click the “Add” button next to the “Not Allowed to Send Notifications” section.

In the “Add Site” window, add the website URL for what you want to stop receiving notifications and click “Add“. In this case, it is a McAfee site.
Alternatively, click the Extra Actions button (three vertical dots) next to the specific site and click Remove.

Remove the McAfee Chrome extension

If you don’t know how to block the McAfee pop-up virus, continue reading this article. When the first method didn’t work, and you still get the McAfee popup notification when you open Chrome, chances are that your system is infected with adware. However, to be sure, you can uninstall the McAfee Chrome extension. If necessary, you can always reinstall it later from the Chrome Web Store.

Launch the Chrome app.
Click the three dots in the top right corner.

Then select More Tools > Extensions.

Turn off the McAfee Extensions button.

Restart the Chrome app and make sure it’s not running.
Or, click the “Remove” button on the McAfee extension to remove it from Chrome.

How to Stop Fake McAfee Pop-Ups on Chrome?

The adware can sometimes send disguised as legitimate notifications. In this case, the notification will look like McAfee but is a fake malicious popup. Thus, attackers send out these notifications hoping that someone will click on them and then go to a phishing page. These notifications can appear as a separate page in the web browser, a popup notification on the site, or a system notification. But how to stop McAfee Popups? All this is done solely by luring the victim to a phishing site with ads that scammers profit from watching (pay-per-view).

Suppose you get these notifications without even opening Chrome and don’t have McAfee installed on your computer. In that case, it’s probably a virus or adware. For example, you might see the message “Virus detected” or “Your McAfee has expired.” You can also identify McAfee scams by looking at their URLs. The URL of a fake notification will be different from the official McAfee website. If you click on such a notification, it redirects you to a completely different site.

As a last resort, you can install the ad-blocking extension from the Chrome Web Store to block fake McAfee ads and other malicious ads. However, read the feedback from users who have downloaded the extension. If none of the methods helped you, you should install proven antivirus software and scan your system. We recommend GridinSoft Anti-malware because, unlike counterparts, it does not inundate the user with notifications but contains all the necessary protection, including Internet protection. However, the main advantage of GridinSoft Anti-malware is that it does not load the system, which is critical for users with not very powerful PCs.

The post How to Stop McAfee Popups on Chrome: Tips, Recommendation appeared first on Gridinsoft Blog.

Also read our article: Signs You’re Dealing with an Online Scam.

According to researchers, with its help, hackers stole millions of dollars from tens of thousands of victims. It turned out that the attackers operate a in large network of more than 200 fake dating and customer support sites, and use these resources to debit other people’s bank cards bought on the dark web.

This campaign uses two types of domains: dating sites and customer support portals (list of addresses can be found in the company report). If you try to visit the websites of the companies that allegedly own these fake resources, you will find that they do not exist at all, or they use non-existent email addresses, such as mail@example.com.

Fake dating sites

At the same time, dating and customer support sites look viable, but receive almost no traffic, occupying low positions in Google search results. The fact is that they exist not to attract users, but to serve as channels for money laundering.

ReasonLabs analysts write that all sites have the same HTML structure and almost the same content, so it looks like they were created using automatic tools. At the same time, fake customer support portals often use the names of non-existent organizations, or try to resemble real brands such as McAfee, ReasonLabs and other firms.

It is also noted that the operators of this campaign seem to have gone to great lengths to hide all 75 fake support portals from being indexed by search engines using the anti-crawler instructions in Robots.txt.

But the biggest challenge for attackers is registering these sites with payment processors, who usually classify them as “high-risk” (even if it’s a legitimate resource) due to their high chargeback rates. In order not to be blacklisted, each site applies individually, as campaign operators are afraid of losing all resources at once if fraud is detected.

If resources need to prove their legitimacy, then all sites have a round-the-clock chat with support and a working phone, outsourced to a real call-center. In addition, all sites list a toll-free number in case users want to cancel a payment, which scammers usually do not offer.

Once the payment processor has approved the request, the hackers use millions of stolen payment cards purchased on the dark web and debit them through their fake websites. Most of the cards belong to residents of the United States, but it is also reported that hackers bought cards from French-speaking countries.

Site operators are very careful and try not to draw attention to themselves. They withdraw small amounts, use common names that can get lost among the victim’s other expenses, use recurring payments with the same amount, and avoid test transactions.

Payment page on one of the scam sites

What’s more, in some cases, the hackers even refund the victims, making their transactions more authentic and making the charge-back ratio seem low.

While many of the 275 bogus sites are still up and running, ReasonLabs experts have already notified payment processors and law enforcement of their findings.

You may also be interested in: 8 Best Practices How to Keep Your Windows 10 Computer Secure in 2022.

The post Scammers Use Fake Dating Sites to Steal Money appeared first on Gridinsoft Blog.

The death of the developer was reported by several major media resources, including Reuters, El Mundo, El País, with reference to the Department of Justice of Catalonia. McAfee’s lawyers confirmed his death to Reuters and the New York Times, and one of them said that it was “the result of a brutal system that had no reason to keep this man in prison for so long.”

Now the police are investigating the circumstances of the death of the American businessman, but local publications write that “everything points to suicide.” McAfee was arrested in Spain in October 2020, when he was detained at Barcelona airport at the request of the US Department of Justice with charges of tax evasion, cryptocurrency fraud and money laundering.

A few hours before the incident became known that the Spanish Supreme Court approved McAfee’s extradition to the United States, where the businessman faced up to 30 years in prison for the above charges.

McAfee considered that the accusations against him are political, and a year and a half before his death, the businessman claimed that the US government was threatening him with reprisals, urging not to believe the news of his suicide.

John McAfee is widely known not only for his business success (he went out of business in 1994), but also for his eccentric behaviour and several scandals. In 2016 and 2020, McAfee tried to run for the presidency of the United States from the Libertarian Party, in 2012, the businessman was suspected of killing neighbour Gregory Faull in Belize, and in 2016 he promised to eat his boot live in case of unsuccessful hacking of the iPhone of a terrorist from San Bernardino.

McAfee was bought by Intel in 2010 for $7.7 billion (the deal closed in 2011). But six years later, due to the scandalous reputation of the founder, the processor-producing giant withdrew McAfee from its structure by selling a controlling stake (51%) to TPG.

The post John McAfee, creator of McAfee antivirus, found dead in prison in Barcelona appeared first on Gridinsoft Blog.

In total, McAfee will stand trial in connection with ten charges. The US Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) intends to sue him separately, claiming that he earned at least $ 23 million from various promotions related to cryptocurrencies and cryptocurrency transactions, violating various laws and regulations.

According to the indictment of the Justice Department, McAfee did not pay taxes on the funds he earned between 2014 and 2018. The government also claims that McAfee has long avoided meeting with tax inspectors and tried to hide his assets, including real estate and a yacht (usually by transferring ownership to other people).

According to prosecutors, McAfee has made tens of millions of dollars from his numerous Twitter followers advertising various cryptocurrencies, and has also not paid any taxes on this. It is also noted that in recent years, McAfee regularly received royalties for various performances and consultations, and also earned on transition of rights to film the story of his life.

“John McAfee made millions from promoting cryptocurrencies, consulting work, speaking and selling the rights to his story for a documentary. From 2014 to 2018, McAfee did not file tax returns, despite receiving significant income from these sources”, — reads a statement from law enforcement officers.

As a result, if found guilty, McAfee could face up to five years in prison for tax avoidance, as well as up to one year in prison on each of five charges of willful tax evasion.

In turn, representatives of the Securities and Exchange Commission write that McAfee earned by telling his subscribers about various cryptocurrencies.

“At the same time, the former head of McAfee did not tell people that he was paid to advertise certain altcoins, and in some cases he even had a stake in the companies in which he called for investments. For example, in one case, McAfee advertised an unnamed ICO for users and at the same time tried to sell his stake invested in this company”, – say the court documents.

In total, advertising for seven ICOs on Twitter brought John McAfee about $23 million, and experts emphasize that in all cases, “McAfee’s recommendations were false and misleading.”

The SEC does not face a jail sentence, but if McAfee is found guilty, he will have to deal with multimillion-dollar fines and penalties.

Jimmy Watson, who has been responsible for McAfee’s personal security in recent years, also appears in court documents. According to authorities, he often helped negotiate on behalf of McAfee and acquainted more than $300,000 in the process.

And for example, another IT legend Steve Wozniak sues YouTube over cryptocurrency scammers.

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