microsoft security scam question

[Kali]

my poor husband has not been on line in years due to our lack of internet connection and my hogging of my laptop. we recently went to the local rural wifi as mentioned in a previous question, so he is now entering the internets universe (and he has even checked out DU for the latest news!)

after being told to never click on anything he wasn't sure of he went ahead and called the number off some pop up thing warning his computer would shut down if he didn't call. fortunately he didn't give them any credit info but they now have his phone number (which is their tough shit because he never answers)

my question is did he get infected by something? what do you recommend he (I) run to double check? this is a win 7 desktop firefox, and I am pretty sure he had essentials activated though I never did go and fully check.

I never get those pop-ups so that is what has me concerned. maybe he didn't install the adblocker. I can't even remember what I have on mine anymore though I am sure I have that

[earthshine]

1. For starters, run the scan function built into Microsoft Security Essentials.

If it says you're okay, you most probably are.

Good luck.

[Kali]

4. will do that

and have him get malwarebytes and run it too. there are more detailed instructions in one of the pinned threads but hopefully he won't need to do all of it.

[Egnever]

2. Security essentials is decent

I always recommend malwarebytes as a Spyware add ware scanner

You can download it free with a two week trial and it is somewhere around $30 a year for three PC's.

Between the two of them you should be kept out of trouble.

I would not want to say he didn't get an infection but most of those are nothing more than pop-ups that are difficult to close.

Either way a scan with malwarebytes will more than likely clean up anything that got in. There is no perfect scanner that I am aware of but malwarebytes and security essentials do a pretty good job together and for a reasonable price. You can just chose to end the trial on the malwarebytes at the end of the two weeks and it becomes an on demand scanner. If you have the $30 to spend it is worth it to have it constantly monitoring the machine especially with someone new to the web.

[Kali]

3. that is all I have on mine

and other than the strange spaz it has at random times I haven't ever had a problem. of course I rarely go anywhere odd so who knows what he did.

he did mention he had to reinstall flash the other day and I have no idea what that was about, maybe where he got the problem.

[Egnever]

5. Flash can be a huge problem

flash is the source of many infections there are also fake prompts for fake flash installs from some sites.