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How to remove Fake Windows Security Alert?
While you were browsing the internet or visiting a certain website, you might have suddenly got a pop-up warning message from Windows that your system contains malware, and you need to take immediate action to recover from it.
Such pop-up warnings are generally scamming and tricks to trap users by creating a sense of fear among them.
In this post, we will know what the fraudulent Microsoft warnings are and how to remove fake Windows security alerts.
What is "Windows Security Alert"?
"Windows Security Alert" is a fake pop-up warning that Windows users encounter when they accidentally or willingly visit any malicious website. It is a kind of Social Engineering attack in which users' psychology is being targeted to force them into calling a fraud tech support number or sending a mail.
The faux pop-up alerts are framed in such a way that users get scared and immediately perform the action directed in the message. In the sense of urgency and anticipation of getting the solution as quickly as possible, they don't think much about the originality of the warning.
When the number displayed on the pop-up is dialed, the call is received by a scammer who pretends to be a technical expert in dealing with such situations. The scammer would provide some completely fake solutions to a fake problem and, in return, would ask the victim to pay the fees. In most cases, the scammers also trick the victims into providing sensitive information like login credentials and much more. They can also ask for taking control of the system by requesting remote access to the system and suggest the users to download and install a malicious program to remove the malware.
The uninformed users would do everything the scammer says and experience a considerable loss, including the monetary.
It is important to know that while browsing the internet, Microsoft or Windows never display virus alerts in the form of pop-ups. Moreover, the reputed organization like Microsoft would never ask their consumers to call them and provide sensitive information for delivering any type of solution.
Why did I get "Windows Security Alert"?
Windows Security Alert generally does not show up on its own. Mostly, it is the action of the user that prompts such malicious pop-ups. Here are the top reasons why "Windows Security Alert" might have popped up on your screen:
While browsing the internet, you might have visited a malicious website by accidentally clicking a link or in the greed of getting a paid application for free.
An Adware program might have infected your system, causing irrelevant pop-ups.
Your browser might be in control of a Browser Hijacker malware program that is causing unintended redirects. Browser Hijacker is a malware type that, after infiltrating your browser, can modify its settings without any user intervention.
You might have unintentionally installed an irrelevant bundled program that might be causing the browser to misbehave and show fake alert pop-ups.
How to get rid of a fake Windows Security Alert?
If you are getting such fake alerts repeatedly, you might want to remove the culprit behind it. Here are the steps for that:
Open the Task Manager and check which process or application is unnecessarily using the system resources. List out such applications.
Launch the Control Panel, and one by one uninstall the suspected applications.
Open your web browser. Go to the extensions page and remove the doubtful extensions or the ones that you no longer use. Also, update the web extensions or add-ons that you regularly use.
If your browser is infected, reset it to the default settings.
If you don't want to take manual trouble of removing culprit malware responsible for fake Windows Security alert, you can go for an allrounder security solution. Security solutions like antimalware programs are designed explicitly for finding out and removing such malicious apps and codes.
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