unable to switch off pc

[freaky]

hi all, ive been helping a friend with her pc she uses for business use for a few years.
had a phone call today, she is getting a pop up for a few days demanding money, and she cant turn the pc off.

ive had a look look and pm is installed, she didnt do it, the only box she had pop up she hit the red cross to as she has been caught out before. it still installed anyway. so much for the 7 screens etc.

she tried phoning them and they refuse to send the removal software unless she pays first. again so much for their remove at any time.

i had a look but couldnt find the files names(have now) and also looked at the turning off problem. any attempt at shutting down or restarting the pc would not work. nothing would happen. BUT if i go into the process and shut down the 2 pm.exe files the pc will shut down normally. has any one came across this problem before?

now ive got the file names i will be removing them, she will be getting in touch with ts and oft. and is it worth billing pm for the electric used of the few days of not being able to shut of her pc?

[jonlewi5]

its certainly worth a try 

the only thing they will say is prove it, prove it was there software that caused this issue.

But as you have said, by removing pm_proc1.exe and pm_proc2.exe from the task manager you can shutdown and restart without a problem. id say its definatly worht a go  

[Bennett Boy]

Freaky raises an important point here regarding his lady friend's experience. I too was sent to Platte's site by a rogue link on Google and once there I desperately tried to get out as soon as possible by clicking the X in the red box, top right.  Too late, the deed was done.  If Platte were an honourable company they would forget those who subscribe accidentally and concentrate on those people who DO want to subscribe. It shouldn't be beyond their abilities to start the clock for subscriptions running only once the CONTENT of the site had been viewed. Since they claim that they can monitor exactly when each of us accesses the content, why don't they do as I suggest? They'd save everybody, including themselves, an awful lot of hassle.

[ForumFriend]

So, Bennett Boy, you didn't go through 7 screens, as they keep insisting?

[Bennett Boy]

No, I didn't go through seven screens, but this was in the MBS days when things were a bit different, and I can't recall now just how many screens I should have gone through, but I only got as far as the home page and then tried to bale out.  Quite a few people have tried to reconstruct the subscribing process looking for flaws, but they always seemed to do so from the point of view of somebody trying to subscribe, not desperately trying NOT to subscribe.

[ForumFriend]

Certainly worth investigating ....

[Bennett Boy]

I didn't investigate myself why I never saw five or seven or however many screens I was supposed to go through because I don't have the technical knowledge to do so, didn't want any more to do with MBS, and was too busy getting rid of the pop-up, which was very intrusive back then.  I did report my experience to another forum and believe some attempt was made to recreate it without success.  In situations like I found myself in there was a degree of panic, but my first instinct was to go for the exit cross and maybe I tried other things as well, and I can't recall exactly how I got out of it.  It was a long time ago.