When you're sitting in the comfort of home in front of your computer, you feel safe, but a Southlake woman said she believes her computer provided the open door for an intruder.
Kathy Richarme said she was home alone, settling in to watch a missed episode of one of her favorite shows on her laptop when the computer inexplicably stopped working and said she had been hacked.
"I did a Bing search and found several sites, and I clicked on it," she recalled. "A blue screen comes up and says there's something wrong with your computer. Your computer is infected. I couldn't close my computer. I couldn't close the site. I couldn't shut it down.”
Richarme said the pop-up gave an 800 number for her to call.
"I asked the company and he said they were Microsoft-authorized," she said. "But I thought, given the sheet that was on my screen, I was speaking to Microsoft tech support."
She said she was told her computer had been hacked by criminals in Mexico, Russia and the Philippines
"And then he came up with a screen to show how many viruses were on my computer due to these hacks," Richarme said. "He told me 5,280."
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The man from a company called Zavions asked Richarme for access to her computer to fix it and charged her credit card $400. When she told her husband, he was skeptical and called the company.
"He said they are the master computer of the Internet," he recalled, chuckling. Zavions refused to give him a full refund, so he contacted NBC 5 Responds.
Zavions LLC has an F rating with the Better Business Bureau because of unresolved consumer complaints very similar to Richarme's. The company argues the rating may be a mistake and blames Kathy's experience on a misunderstanding.
In an awkwardly worded statement, a spokesman wrote:
"When customers have virus we do educate our customers about them and i think there must have been some miss communication because of which customer was in a impression that her computer is being hacked."
The spokesman acknowledged that the company’s marketing agency was responsible for locking up Richarme’s computer and displaying a pop-up add with Zavion’s phone number, but he argued customers are told that Zavions is independent and not affiliated with Microsoft. Zavions provides customers with a document stating such, which Richarme signed.
Richarme, though, said she already has anti-virus software and was coerced into buying a service she didn't need.
"It's very scary for me, and I feel certain that I'm not the only one that this has happened to,” said Kathy.
After NBC 5 Responds contacted Zavions, Richarme received a full refund. The company’s operations manager said company will offer anyone a refund in 30 days if the customer is not satisfied with their service.
Microsoft sent the following statement:
"Customers will never receive a call from Microsoft or our partners asking for a credit card number to charge for computer fixes. Cybercriminals often use the names of well-known companies, like Microsoft, to convince people their services are legitimate."
The NBC 5 Responds team has this advice:
- If you get a pop-up window promising technical support, don't take the risk. Call Microsoft directly.
- The FTC says do not give control of your computer to any third party you don't know and trust.
- Never provide your credit card information to someone who claims to be from tech support.
