ClickFix scam hijacks victims data in with CAPTCHA test | Latest Tech News
It’s a digital wolf in sheep’s clothes.
A Toronto faculty pupil has issued a warning to the public after practically falling prey to an insidious new human test scam proliferating on the web, which she detailed on Reddit.
“I can see so many people falling for this. It’s evil,” Alexandra, who withheld her last identify, wrote in her PSA.
The Canuck said that she stumbled across the “diabolical” cyberscheme while she was in class studying an article online.
An accompanying picture reveals the innocuous-looking pop-up that appeared on her pc screen, prompting her to full a number of “verification steps” to ostensibly show that she’s not a robot.
“I thought of my mom, who would easily fall for this,” the Canadian explained. “She’s not very computer-literate, and I was hoping sharing could prevent at least one person from getting their device hacked.” ponta1414 – stock.adobe.com
The sequence entailed holding the Windows key and R to load a verification window, after which they have been told to concurrently press “CTRL+V,” before clicking “Enter” to full the test.
Unfortunately, following these instructions would’ve resulted in in her system being compromised. Dubbed ClickFix, this more and more prevalent scam tips customers into working a dangerous program on their Mac or Windows terminal by masquerading as a CAPTCHA test.
Once this Trojan Horse had been downloaded, the cybercriminals concerned would’ve been ready to circumvent her online safeguards and harvest her delicate personal data.
Thankfully, Alexandra, a former PC store worker who has constructed computer systems, caught clever to the scam before it was too late, Newsweek reported. “I know Win + R opens Dialog and pasting something you don’t know is very stupid,” Alexandra told the publication. “I have had to open and run things on Dialog before.”
The assault is one of the most ubiquitous. InfiniteFlow – stock.adobe.com
Despite these pink flags, Alexandra said that most of the classmates with whom she shared the pop-up “weren’t aware of the issue.”
So she shared the aforementioned PSA to Reddit with the hopes of stopping others from getting hornswoggled.
“I thought of my mom, who would easily fall for this,” the Canadian explained. “She’s not very computer-literate, and I was hoping sharing could prevent at least one person from getting their device hacked.”
Reddit viewers have been grateful for her warning.
“I’ve never seen that yet. truly diabolical and would absolutely work on the average person,” said one fan, decrying this chameleonic scheme.
Another wrote, “And they act like people using adblockers as a basic safety precaution are the villains.”
“It’s probably the single most successful attack vector to compromise a device,” cautioned a third.
According to data by the cybersecurity firm ESET, ClickFix assaults skyrocketed by 517% from 2024 to 2025, turning into the second most common vector after phishing, InfoSecurity Magazine reported.
This isn’t the only cyberscam infecting people’s devices.
Techsperts are warning customers about a sneaky new calendar scam, in which cybercrooks have found out a sneaky method to blast iPhones and iPads with bogus alerts in order to hack their personal data.
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