My internet screen (Safari) locked up and gave an 877 number to call for Apple support. They downloaded AdwareMedic to diagnose what was wrong with my iMac. They said I had a Koobface worm that redirected my IP address to a foreign IP address. They wanted $199.99 to fix the problem through IP Guard. Has anyone else had this problem? Are they part of Apple Support or is this another scam?
iMac, OS X Yosemite (10.10.1)
My Apple Store does not open till 10 am Mountain time. I'm going to check with them before I do anything.
You fell for a phishing scam. DO NOT install any third party antivirus, worm removal, performance enhancing, cleaning etc utility to your iMac. DO NOT pay anything to anyone for any type of Mac repair unless it is an Apple Store or AASP (Apple Authorized Service Provider).
Apple does not contact end-users directly for service issues. If your machine is not operating correctly, please post the problem, which iMac you have and the version of OS X installed.
That is a scam. Please note that this is not related in any way to AdwareMedic. I'm not sure why they had you download it... probably in hopes that they could show you that you were infected with "malware," which they would charge you to help you remove. Of course, AdwareMedic doesn't actually detect malware, and any adware that it detected it would remove for you for free. Still, it wouldn't be the first time that scammers have tried to misrepresent the meaning of results from some legit tool.
Koobface is a very old piece of malware, now extinct and no longer capable of infecting a Mac. You definitely did not have a Koobface infection.
Because you gave the scammers remote access to your Mac, it should now be considered compromised. You need to erase your hard drive and reinstall everything from scratch. See:
How to reinstall Mac OS X from scratch
(Fair disclosure: I may receive compensation from links to my sites, TheSafeMac.com and AdwareMedic.com, in the form of buttons allowing for donations. Donations are not required to use my site or software.)
Koobface worm?
