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advice needed (aussie.zone)

Hi, I’m not a coder etc but I’m not a complete noob with computers.

My FIL has apparently been scammed / hacked by some shithead (according to wife) who has apparently managed to get control whenever he turns his laptop on. I don’t know much more than that right now. The situation is pretty shityy because the poor old man lost EVERYTHING in recent flooding; all possessions, personal documents etc. He was given this laptop to help him get his life back together, personal admin etc.

He’s actually an OG coder and mathematician but is old enough to be vulnerable to the crap that these scum pull on the unsuspecting.

I’m wondering if there’s a way (rubberduck?) to quickly delete teamware etc as soon as the pc boots. Not sure how much admin control he has anymore.

Is there a safe mode (?) way of getting back control / kicking external admins?

Many thanks for any advice.

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[-] phx@lemmy.ca 3 points 11 months ago

Yeah, even if you're extremely knowledgeable with computers I do not recommend trusting the OS (or sometimes the whole device) after it's been compromised. Back stuff up, wipe, reinstall.

That or have a fresh drive installed and then a clean OS, then pop the old one on a USB enclosure and grab just what you need from it. Beware that a really nasty hacker could have invented remaining files with Trojans/malware so definitely re-download any installers rather than using the stuff from the old drive.

this post was submitted on 04 Dec 2023
6 points (80.0% liked)

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