http://www.greenmouse.co.nz/blog/ The latest Blog feeds from www.greenmouse.co.nz en-us Sat, 02 May 2026 05:18:38 +1200 Rocketspark http://www.greenmouse.co.nz/blog/post/156002/microsoft-365-licensing-emails/ Many people who have Microsoft 365 Personal and Family licenses have recently received emails from Microsoft about their licenses. These are genuine emails; here's what they're all about. Over the last couple of years Microsoft have added their AI feature, Copilot, to their Personal and Family packages, and then increased the cost of those licenses for that new feature. What some people realised was that if you elect to cancel the license, you would be offered the option to return to what t... Tue, 11 Nov 2025 09:09:03 +1300 http://www.greenmouse.co.nz/blog/#post156002 http://www.greenmouse.co.nz/blog/post/151012/classic-microsoft-password-scam/ We've been forwarded several copies of this email phishing scam - it seems to be doing the rounds locally again. It's a classic Microsoft 365 phishing scam, looking to get hold of your MS365 account credentials.Here's how we can tell it's bogus:Microsoft will never contact you via email asking you to click on a link and enter your password. In fact, unless you have a setting selected to change your password periodically, the default setting now is that passwords do not need to be updated. T... Mon, 25 Aug 2025 11:12:45 +1200 http://www.greenmouse.co.nz/blog/#post151012 http://www.greenmouse.co.nz/blog/post/145688/high-risk-attachment-scam/ A very high risk and effective attachment scam is going around at the moment. We've had two clients attacked by it just recently so I want to provide a run down so everyone can be aware of what is happening.In both cases the malicious software arrived via email and appeared in the form of an email attachment. One was a OneNote attachment, and the other was a DropBox file share, but they were clearly variations of the same scam. Here's how it works: You receive an email from a known contact,... Thu, 22 May 2025 12:39:22 +1200 http://www.greenmouse.co.nz/blog/#post145688 http://www.greenmouse.co.nz/blog/post/143563/scareware--an-ad-posing-as-a-virus/ Believe it or not, this alarming, full screen pop-up is an ad. Or at least, it started as one. We had several questions about this very piece of 'scareware' last week.Scareware is a type of scam which uses shock, fear, or anxiety to induce a panic reaction in a User, reducing their hesitation and reservations. Basically, a state of 'freak-out', which is not conducive to good decision making. Happily, several of our usual clients closed the lid and came directly to us, rather than calling the num... Tue, 01 Apr 2025 13:14:14 +1300 http://www.greenmouse.co.nz/blog/#post143563 http://www.greenmouse.co.nz/blog/post/142086/windows-10-end-of-support/ We've been fielding a lot of questions lately about the end of support for Windows 10. Microsoft has upped the ante on the messaging appearing on Windows computers, insisting that people upgrade to Windows 11. The official date is still listed as the 14th of October, 2025; as I write this in February, there are 8 months left. ... Thu, 20 Feb 2025 11:05:55 +1300 http://www.greenmouse.co.nz/blog/#post142086 http://www.greenmouse.co.nz/blog/post/138725/a-refurbished-laptop-for-christmas/ Are you looking for a portable laptop for work or school? Maybe a Christmas gift for a student for next year? Here at Green Mouse we can source refurbished laptops. These are typically a few years old but cost about half the price of a new laptop. If you're on a limited budget it can be better to buy good quality refurbished than low quality new.This morning I've ordered an HP ProBook which will be for sale this week for $495 including GST. Here are the specs:Intel i5 8265U CPU8GB RAM256GB SSDWi... Tue, 03 Dec 2024 09:43:00 +1300 http://www.greenmouse.co.nz/blog/#post138725 http://www.greenmouse.co.nz/blog/post/138288/new-ads-in-the-notification-centre/ Recently we've been assisting people in turning off notifications generated by their internet browsers which have been popping up in the Notification Centre (the bottom right of your computer). The Notification Centre on Windows 10 computers is a little square speech mark on the taskbar, and in Windows 11 it's a bell, and it's part of the date and time interface.The Notifications Centre has become something of a conduit for ads recently as people wise-up to advertising that comes through via ema... Mon, 25 Nov 2024 10:22:36 +1300 http://www.greenmouse.co.nz/blog/#post138288 http://www.greenmouse.co.nz/blog/post/136882/phone-scams-are-the-worst/ Phones scams are still the most common type of scam we see people falling victim to in our local community. We saw another one last week. In this one the scammer was posing as the Fraud Protection Team from the bank that the victim happened to be with, which is probably why she was initially convinced. Luckily her and her husband figured out what was happening before allowing the scammer access to their bank accounts, but the phone call went on for about four hours before they finally hung up on... Tue, 29 Oct 2024 11:05:14 +1300 http://www.greenmouse.co.nz/blog/#post136882 http://www.greenmouse.co.nz/blog/post/135142/another-phishing-scam/ Here's the latest phishing email going around. We've received it and so have a few of our customers (this or something with a similar layout). It has a familiar feel to it; and a casual vibe, like you might expect from a colleague. We've had some clients asking whether it's indicative of their email account being compromised - it is not. Despite having a real person's name and initials, the actual sender email address clearly does not match with the email address of the real person. What ha... Tue, 24 Sep 2024 11:09:41 +1200 http://www.greenmouse.co.nz/blog/#post135142 http://www.greenmouse.co.nz/blog/post/134024/another-classic-microsoft-scam/ I received this phishing email today from a client - I've seen a couple of these recently. This is the kind of bold, capitalised text that Kerrin refers to as yelling. The Microsoft logo is correct, but the text font is not anything like what you would normally see in a real email from Microsoft. It seems they've sacrificed looking legitimate for threats and urgency this time. I wasn't brave enough to open the attachment so I can't tell you what that said, or what kind of nasty infections it mig... Tue, 27 Aug 2024 09:36:35 +1200 http://www.greenmouse.co.nz/blog/#post134024