I have had Avast antvirus for around 6 years, the first two years were free but I then paid for the last four years, it has worked very well. I was using Internet Explore but then started to use Google Chrome as it was recommended to me, I bought a new computer six months ago and I was told Chrome was very good. Last week somehow two programs called Roll Around and Buzzads appeared on my computer, they only seemed to pop up on Chrome so I uninstalled and went back to IE, no pop ups on there, I then installed google chrome and again Roll around and Buzzads appeared with lots of ads popping all over the place so again I uninstalled it.
Then I received a message from Avast telling me that Grimefighter was now at half price and it would work wonders by keeping my computer in tiptop condition and clean and would run much faster. As I now have a 1tb hard drive I had no problem with it being slow but if it could help with the ads and because I trusted Avast I thought why not.
I received an email a few minutes after I had accepted and paid by PayPal to say that I was now a grimefighter and I could now run grimefighter, it started to run and then came up with a message to say that it had been aborted because no windows installation or your drives are encrypted. I then tried to close down. This was on Sunday morning and for over 3 days I have been trying to get rid of it but to no avail, it in a loop, I have tried closing it down, taking the plug out of the wall socket, leaving it for a few hours or overnight, but nothing works, it opens with the green screen and the rather silly cartoon figures. I cannot get into my computer, I cannot do anything apart from use the internet as the search is still on. I have sent 3 eamails to Avast but have not had a reply, I sent message on the Avast website but it keeps asking for a ticket and it will not let me in to find one. I then called them on the phone yesterday and spoke to a rather unfriendly young man who informed me that the reason Grimefighter wasn't working was that my computer was not configured properly, I told him that it was a new computer and that it has been working great until I bought Grimefighter, he said that he was an expert, and he knew what he was talking about as he had been to University, I then said that I would like to have it uninstalled and I would then ask for a refund. He told me that all he could do was to pass me on to the next level of of experts and if paid 125 uk pounds. I asked him to explain why I had to pay this large sum of money to fix something that was Avasts fault, he said it wasn't it was my fault and not theirs and if I wanted it fixed then I would have to pay. I told him that I was a pensioner and I could not afford to pay that money. his reply was there was nothing that could be done until I paid it.
I told him that this was a scam and he asked me to repeat it which I did, he then said this conversation is recorded, I told him it didn't make any difference, it was wrong to sell a program which didn't work and then to ask for money to fix the problem. Again he said that it wasn't their fault, it was mine.
So I am now left without windows, all my files, folders etc. are on there. I am also a volunteer for a charity and a lot of the charites work is on there and it can never be replaced.
I will now have to try and find a local computer person who can help me get my windows back and hope that if they can nothing is lost. If they can't then not only have I lost all my data but I have lost my new computer and I cannot afford to buy a new one. I am not very impressed.
