A Salmon Arm woman spent a day frantically cancelling credit cards and changing passwords, after she was duped by a computer scam.
Barbara Bosshardt wants to warn other people in the area of a scam, which, she says, targets unsuspecting and often unsophisticated computer users.
She was awakened Friday morning at 6:45 by a woman who told her to get to her computer immediately as it was downloading viruses that would disable it. When she reached the computer, which had been left on, there was an error message on the screen saying “diagnostic problems.”
Feeling panicky about what was going on, Bosshardt agreed to give the woman her credit card number to purchase software that would supposedly fix her system.
Within 15 minutes, hundreds of dollars in fraudulent purchases were being made with her credit card.
“I feel so stupid that I got taken, but they were so slick and I was still half-asleep.
“I just don’t want anyone else to have to go through all the hassle I’ve gone through.”