It’s not paranoia if they are really out to get you!
A lot of my friends are not computer-savvy. A lot of my friends also run Windows in one of its many incarnations, and when they have bizarre problems with their computers, I hear about them.
One friend (who shall remain nameless) had a weird issue where her keyboard would spew random characters every so often. As she was describing the problem, I checked a few websites and found that there actually was a virus circulating that matched her symptoms to a tee.
Her response?
“Oh well, it’s no big deal. It’s kind of cute!”
Then I launched in to a whole explanation about how having a lackadaisical approach to securing her computer could leave her compromised — and she could become a pawn of nebulous Eastern European hacker groups who get paid to turn your computer in to part of a botnet and use it for purposes such as spamming everyone with Viagra ads.
My friend politely listened as if I’d just said, “We have to wear the tin foil hats to keep the aliens from controlling our minds!”, but finally… FINALLY… a “mainstream” source of news has covered this topic.
From The New York Times.
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