Like many frauds, ClickFix depends on people acting quickly and without thinking through what they are doing. The warning is to pause and consider each step whenever you are online.
The con has opened a security loophole that is being exploited extensively, a specialist quoted by the paper said. He called it the most popular way to get malware onto a computer.
This version works differently. Instead of those familiar checks, it asks the user to press a series of keys and then press enter.
The page frames the request as a test. Visitors are told they must better prove they are not a robot, and are then given keyboard instructions.
Checking a box on the page gives the system permission to copy malicious code to the clipboard on the computer, The Guardian reported.
Following the prompts pastes that hidden text into the system. The result is that the computer is infected.
Other versions of the same scam tell users that something went wrong when displaying the webpage. They then offer similar instructions, presented as a way to fix the problem.
The specialist said the method was certainly not the only way criminals plant malware, but that today it is definitely the most popular.