Home > Fake AV Facts

Fake AV Facts

Posted on 28 November 2009
Initiation: late 2005.
Intentions: persuade a computer user to pay for a fake program license.
Predominant in: US.
Infection methods: fake scanner web page, fake video activex codec, trojan.
Also known as: corrupt computer software, rogue programs, false product, misleading applications.

Probably a significant part of defenseless cyber-humanity has been deceived and forced to pay for useless computer program, which imitated anti-virus program, promising to deal with unexpectedly appeared computer problems. Those are called rogue programs. The purpose of these programs is really not to make computer secure and protected, but to scare user and make him believe that his system is insecure and needs attention. An impression of infected machine is made by generating false declarations, which state that viruses has been found on computer system, offering rogue program as a solution at the same time...

Every day many internet users are compromised by dozens of sites, containing web pages with links to fake AV and malware, pointing to executable files, that are rarely recognized by Anti-virus programs. The internal links of such web sites are directing user to pages with various tricks, like fake movie player, fake online scanner, etc. Fake movie players distribute false products by masquerading as a video codec or player setup for porn movies. In this case cyberspace users are usually taken on sites, which simulate a collection of pornographic movies, but that actually contains only links to executable malware. Those are fake sites, with a layout similar to YouTube.com, which require to download flash player to watch porn related movies.

However, fake AV programs under the vast cloud of names seem to be widespread today, while in fact, there are several forged AV scanners, frequently changing the code to evade recognition. Facing the exponential growth of this type of programs available in the network is very likely, that continuing at this rate, we will arrive at a saturation of the market for those who continue to create and offer fake anti-virus online.