{"id":456997,"date":"2022-08-18T12:24:22","date_gmt":"2022-08-18T10:24:22","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/?p=456997"},"modified":"2022-08-18T12:27:02","modified_gmt":"2022-08-18T10:27:02","slug":"scammers-send-phony-microsoft-office-usbs-that-install-malware","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/security\/456997-scammers-send-phony-microsoft-office-usbs-that-install-malware.html","title":{"rendered":"Scammers send phony Microsoft Office USBs that install malware"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Scammers in the UK have been sending fake Microsoft Office suite USBs to random addresses that install malware on people&#8217;s computers, according to a Tom&#8217;s Hardware <strong><a href=\"https:\/\/www.tomshardware.com\/news\/scammers-distribute-fake-microsoft-office-usb-sticks-with-malware\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">report<\/a><\/strong>.<\/p>\n<p>The ruse makes victims believe they had mistakenly received a legitimate edition of Office Professional Plus worth $439 (R7,330).<\/p>\n<p>Once plugged into a PC, a virus warning appears, prompting the victim to call a fake support line, through which the scammers try to persuade the victim to provide them with remote access to the computer.<\/p>\n<p>They also persuade the victim to provide them with payment information.<\/p>\n<p>Cybersecurity consultant Martin Pitman provided further details on how the scam works.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;As soon as they had plugged the USB into the computer, a warning screen appeared saying there was a virus,&#8221; he said.<\/p>\n<p>Pitman said the helpdesk installed some form of remote access software and took control of a victim&#8217;s computer as soon as they called the number provided alongside the virus warning.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;Here the hackers &#8216;sorted&#8217; the problem and then passed the victim over to the Office 365 subscription team to help complete the action,&#8221; he added.<\/p>\n<p>Microsoft has acknowledged the issue, saying that it is a rare occurrence.<\/p>\n<p>It said an approach where scammers send product keys via email and then send a link to download malicious software is more common.<\/p>\n<hr \/>\n<h3 class=\"my-4\">Now read: <a href=\"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/security\/456869-windows-security-update-causes-bitlocker-recovery-screens-and-boot-problems.html\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Windows security update causes BitLocker recovery screens and boot problems<\/a><\/h3>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>The baiting technique makes victims believe they mistakenly received an Office Professional Plus installation USB.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":341076,"featured_media":456365,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_sma_x_autopost_status":"idle","_sma_x_autopost_error":"","_sma_x_post_id":"","_sma_facebook_post_id":"","_sma_instagram_post_id":"","_sma_threads_post_id":"","_sma_x_attempts":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[27],"tags":[62562,801,80693,44440,6599,17998],"class_list":["post-456997","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-security","tag-delivery-scam","tag-malware","tag-martin-pitman","tag-microsoft-365","tag-microsoft-office","tag-office-365"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/456997"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/341076"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=456997"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/456997\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":457053,"href":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/456997\/revisions\/457053"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/456365"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=456997"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=456997"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=456997"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}