Foolishly gave access to my iMac.

magsirl

Hi, I am hoping someone can help me please. I had a problem trying to add a smart bulb to my Alexa. Unfortunately I managed to knock Alexa offline. I was checking how to get it back online when I had a chat from Alexa amazon. I was told I would get a call within 5 mins. I had this call and I assumed I was speaking with Amazon. Long story short she said we had root kit virus in the network. This was dangerous and could have our bank details stolen. I needed to purchase software to get rid of it. She had access to my partners iMac at this stage trying to see what my problem was. When she told me how much it cost. I told her I had no money. She eventually gave me her name and phone number to purchase it when I had the money. My partner has removed team view she had used to access. He ran Malwarebytes and Bit defender and a deep system scan. All are clean but we are worried sick now if she has added anything to his IMac. Any advise please? I know I am usually so careful and feel sick I was caught out.
She had given us a website to go to first it was www. 898.TV/ download1 but it did not work so she had to access the IMac then.

oh_really

Sorry I shouldn't have linked directly to the download....https://www.malwarebytes.com/antirootkit/

magsirl

Thank you oh_really

magsirl

@oh_really Thank you for the link. Unfortunately it is an exe file and he is unable to run it on a Mac. Any suggestions please?

magsirl

Hi @oh_really. He has tried to download the file but it appears to be only for windows. It is an exe file only that he can find. Any ideas please?

macman

You don't have a rootkit virus on the iMac. You were simply told that because it sounds scary and encourages you to hand over control and money to the scammer. 
If you are still concerned then simply use Time Machine to restore it to the previous state before this incident. 

magsirl

@macman . Thank you macman. He has never done a back up before and he is not sure what exactly he should back up? How would he restore it to previous state? I have done a roll back on windows previously and it was very easy pick a date but this seems more complex. If you could help that would be great. Many thanks.

TadleyBaggie

If you haven't previously set up Time Machine and been performing backups, it's too late now.

magsirl

Hi TadleyBaggie, the time machine has been set up and regularly backed up just never needed to restore it all. He has now restored it to a restore point from earlier in the day. I think it was the fright of someone accessing the iMac and panicking to make sure it was properly restored. Thank you all for your help and support. It has been very much appreciated. 

macman

Time Machine will back up to the main drive in the absence of a separate external hard drive, but this only is of any use in this limited kind of scenario. Much more commonly, the main drive will fail, be stolen, or damaged, in which case the backups are lost along with the original. data 
So, the OP is strongly advised to purchase an external drive and back up to that, unless that's what they are already doing, which is not clear from their last post.

magsirl

@macman, Hi macman. Sorry I did not make it very clear. My partner has got a TimeCapsule which Time Machine is backed up to. Sorry I am not very technical and did not make that very clear. Thank you for all your help.