Is this screen genuine?

Just recently when I've opened my MacBook Pro I have twice had a screen with an apparently genuine apple web address pop up telling me that my lappy is infected with a virus from a website I have recently visited and I need to press OK to run repair and remove said virus stuff. The App Store icon appears on this screen but I am highly suspicious anyway, so have closed the screen down whereupon my normal Firefox pages appear. Unfortunately I forgot to take a screen shot! Arrgh. Does anyone know anything about this? I don't visit weird websites as far as I am aware .... Many thanks in advance.

No it's not genuine. It's called "ransomware". Don't do anything the webpage/pop-up says. Just close the window or quit the application. And reopen.

- Nick

pigoo3 said:

No it's not genuine. It's called "ransomware". Don't do anything the webpage/pop-up says. Just close the window or quit the application. And reopen.

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@ Goody4Paws - agree w/ Nick - you have 'ransomware' (a.k.a. 'scareware') - if not successful w/ just quitting the web page, some of the steps below may help, plus the last three items are recommended to help prevent this nuisance. Dave

Ransomware Removal

Force quit Safari.
Turn off your Wi-Fi or disconnect the ethernet cable.
Reopen Safari and close the offending tab(s).
Clear ‘History & Data’ in the Safari menu.
Reconnect to internet, i.e. Wi-Fi or ethernet cable.
Add ‘extensions’: AdBlock & Ghostery.
Use Malwarebytes Anti-Malware for Mac.
Visit http://www.adwaremedic.com/index.php.

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Guys, thank you both so much!!! My instincts were that this was something to be careful of and clearly my instincts are still working well. It pops up when I first log on after the lappy has been turned off overnight, so far only twice. But I'll certainly take more precautions now I know what I'm dealing with. Really really appreciate your advice. Many thanks! Kim/Goody4paws

goody4paws said:

It pops up when I first log on after the lappy has been turned off overnight, so far only twice.

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If this is the case…what's happening is…when the computer is turned back on (or rebooted)…the computer is relogging into the web pages it was logged into during the last "computing session".

What should cure this is:

- Turn the computer on.
- Now turn the WiFi off.
- Individually close all open browser/Safari windows.
- Quit the browser app/Safari.
- Reopen browser/Safari
- Turn Wifi back on.

Now surf the internet as usual…and DON'T revisit the website the problem started from.

- Nick

Thanks for giving me such a straightforward fix for this. Now my problem only remains that I have no idea which website I visited that started the situation in the first place!

Have a look at this article:

Scary Internet Scam Becoming Disturbingly Common
http://tidbits.com/article/15777

If you get that bogus screen only when your Internet browser is running, follow the advice in that article. For Firefox, that is to hold down the Option key the next time that you launch Firefox, to launch it in Safe Mode, and then click Refresh Firefox in the Firefox Safe Mode dialog.

If you get that bogus screen even when your Internet browser is not running, download this free software and run it to clear out the adware that you have contracted:

MalwareBytes (free)
https://www.malwarebytes.org/antimalware/mac/

Thank you all again for giving me the tools to rescue myself.