Flash player may be out of date scam

duplicate (please delete)

windoc said:

I am no expert; however, from what I have been able to gather, Windows Defender is reminiscent of having a security guard inside of a school building, and dealing with the threat once it's already in the building. On the other hand, third-party software, such as McAfee, Norton, Kaspersky, and the likes (depending on the packages you buy), can deal with threats before they enter. At least that is what they intend to do, and most of the time they are successful.

For example, I navigated to a website the other day. I clicked on a link directly from a search in duckduckgo, and Kaspersky Internet Security informed me that it was a malicious website, and closed the connection immediately.

Windows Defender would have let the browser load through to that site, and then it would have dealt with the threat once it arrived in your computer. So you have to understand the protection that is offered by different Security packages. I am sure someone here can help you much better than I can.

Thanks for the information.
I understand everything you mention. The intent of my post was is there anything I can do to eliminate this problem.
--- On the duplicate (please delete), that is not a positive approach.
--- What you don't know is that I have searched for the problem in this forum more than once during the last 3 weeks or so not only on my computer but on other computers at the senior center.
--- There plenty of Flash Player threads but I didn't see any of them that dealt with the issue I brought up.
--- If there are any I don't mind it being brought to my attention.

I'll still "complain" on Microsoft Feedback Hub, but I don't have any confidence on what, if anything, they'll do about.

MeAndMyComputer said:

Thanks for the information.
I understand everything you mention. The intent of my post was is there anything I can do to eliminate this problem.
--- On the duplicate (please delete), that is not a positive approach.
--- What you don't know is that I have searched for the problem in this forum more than once during the last 3 weeks or so not only on my computer but on other computers at the senior center.
--- There plenty of Flash Player threads but I didn't see any of them that dealt with the issue I brought up.
--- If there are any I don't mind it being brought to my attention.

I'll still "complain" on Microsoft Feedback Hub, but I don't have any confidence on what, if anything, they'll do about.

Have you tried Malwarebytes? They have a version that will attempt to remove trojans and viruses.

MeAndMyComputer said:

The intent of my post was is there anything I can do to eliminate this problem.

Yes, there is something you can do to eliminate pretty much completely the "your Flash version is not up to date" thing. You need to start using script blocking. I dont use Edge at all. I open Edge after Windows updates to apply updates and open only 1 site (same site every time). Thats all I do with Edge. What I am going to tell you applies to Firefox but is likely you could do something similar with Edge. I use NoScript in Firefox. my every day browser.

Let me show you an example of the power of NoScript. I posted this pictures at another forum a few days ago. Look at the first one, on that one, I am using a new Firefox profile without NoScript or any content blocker installed. You can see the Flash needs to be updated scam, its there because there are malicious scripts running in that page. If you click click to update Flash, you might get infected. It is malware.



Now, look at this one. Same page, but clean, no more malicious scripts running. no more Flash needs to be updated problem. Thats the power of NoScript. I dont use adblockers or any other content blocker but NoScript. NoScript is not available for Edge, IE or Chrome but you might be able to find something similar for those browsers.



Bo

This is what I did today
Forum 28655 Reinstall and Re-register Microsoft Edge in Windows 10
Reinstall and Re-register Microsoft Edge in Windows 10 Windows 10 Tutorials
--- To Reinstall and Re-Register Microsoft Edge for All Accounts
--- Since 8wekyb3d8bbwe is common all of the time, I’m hoping the above procedure will help restore the 8wekyb3d8bbwe to default settings.

In summary the items in red are the variables: the Trojan:JS/Flafisi.D. is constant.
C:\Users\hello\AppData\Local\Packages\Microsoft.MicrosoftEdge_8wekyb3d8bbwe\AC\#!001\MicrosoftEdge\C ache\SI80NOFG\FlashPlayer[1].hta
--- From ja2wivisapro.com/”string of numbers”/FlashPlayer.hta
--- Trojan:JS/Flafisi.D. Alert level: Severe. Is always involved.

Since Sat I’ve had only one occurrence and it was when I was viewing a slide show of some WWII information and there was another time that happened when I was viewing a slide show but I don’t recall what is was for.
--- I hope I’ll be able to narrow down if some websites are particularly responsible for this issue.
--- I don’t check out all the news but I’ll also need to determine whether the issue can be the result of Edge’s Start page news or Microsoft’s news app in the Start page or if it doesn’t matter.
--- It might be coincidence, but this issue didn’t start until 1709 was installed.
--- Also it isn't true that Flash Player isn't up-to-date, it's a scam attempting to infect the computer with that Trojan:JS/Flafisi.D.

I prefer to continue using Edge as my default browser.

In checking with Microsoft's Feedback Hub, well I don't see any help there.

One last thing now, with all of the news articles in Edge's Start page & Microsoft's news app, I'd suspect that Flash Player is in use on a lot of those articles, but getting 1 a week means to me it's certain web sites that are the source of the problem.

windoc said:

Have you tried Malwarebytes? They have a version that will attempt to remove trojans and viruses.

Thank you for that reminder.
In my opening post, I included
"I’ve also run MBAM Premium 14-day free trial before restarting Windows Defender but it comes up clean"
--- I suspect since the Trojan hasn't infected the computer, there isn't anything to remove.

@ bo elam in post #6, I appreciate the information because it makes sense and is helpful.
However I plan on staying with Edge and am monitoring what any future occurrences consist of.

MeAndMyComputer said:

@ bo elam in post #6, I appreciate the information because it makes sense and is helpful.
However I plan on staying with Edge and am monitoring what any future occurrences consist of.

You could try Ublock Origin for Edge. Its not NoScript but is a fine program that works about the same that is developed by a reputable developer. If I was using Edge I would be using it. The program is not easy to learn but once you do, you can use it to turn the sharks of the internet into sardines. Read the comments in the link bellow. To get into script blocking, you need to get in the advanced section. Read the tutorial.
-https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/store/p/ublock-origin/9nblggh444l4-

Bo