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back to article Royal Family engagement creates scareware opportunity

The British Royal Family launched the biggest scareware marketing opportunity for months on Tuesday when Prince William announced plans to marry his long-term girlfriend Kate Middleton next year. Cybercrooks commonly manipulate search results for newsworthy items to point surfers towards scareware portals that warn of non- …

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  1. Roger Kynaston
    Happy

    But isn't this ...

    ... a second level scareware - creating scares about scareware fests.

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  2. Blofeld's Cat
    Troll

    Congratulations

    Excellent! - I wondered how El Reg was going to get an IT angle out of this.

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  3. James Pickett

    Safety

    Hard not to be amused by the 'Get Safe' promotional puff: "expert advice from the British government".

    Sounds like a non-sequitur to me...

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  4. Anonymous Coward
    Coat

    Not sure...

    ...what week in 2011 the wedding will take place, but it will be the wrong one to quite sniffing glue.

    Not that I have anything against the couple, in fact that is the problem, how to escape the muffled running royal commentary as the entire country watches to see if the royals can out do the Beckhams, not to mention weeks of documentaries popping up in odd places about this wedding, terrorism scares. previous weddings, etc... the only hope I can find is that they might do a comedy-special positing what sort of doo Harry would have

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    1. Mike Flugennock
      Reply Icon
      Pint

      Royal Wedding mania

      an Anonymous Coward sez:

      "Not that I have anything against the couple, in fact that is the problem, how to escape the muffled running royal commentary as the entire country watches to see if the royals can out do the Beckhams..."

      Well, I'm American myself, but I don't think that anything regarding the upcoming Royal Wedding will even come close to the Royal Wedding insanity that ensued over the Charles'n'Diana zaniness. Hell, even the US media went totally batshit over that one, so I can only imagine what it must've been like for any Brits who were trying to get away from all the Royal Wedding mania. Besides, it's got to better than the Beckham saga only because the Royal Family seems to possess just a smidgen more class.

      "...the only hope I can find is that they might do a comedy-special positing what sort of doo Harry would have..."

      Yeah, good luck with that. Too bad you guys don't have that "Spitting Image" show on TV over there anymore.

      (pint of ale icon, because you're probably going to need many of them to deaden your senses against all the Royal Wedding media nuttiness)

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  5. Anonymous John
    Black Helicopters

    Burying bad news?

    I suppose it's just a coincidence it was announced on the same day that the Guantánamo detainees are being given shedloads of compensation.

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    1. Anonymous Coward
      Reply Icon
      Thumb Up

      Possibly. Possibly.

      Though Mrs Windsor wouldn't be having with anyone messing with her family, and especially after the last boisterous round of weddings... you know I'm getting an intense 80s deja vu between a return of the Tories, crippling recession, amputation-level public cuts, but no chance of The Clash being on tour though... :^(

      Have to say though that the renditioneer story feels more shameful than a general sense of bad; nice to know that the world can see the UK respects the human rights of UK citizens, unless a high functioning psychopath from outside the UK lets us watch when it all magically becomes perfectly legal and democratic.

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  6. jake Silver badge

    Out of curiosity ...

    Do all y'all right-pondians still watch the same television shows at the same time?

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    1. Steve 114
      Reply Icon
      Thumb Down

      No

      No

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  7. Big Al
    Joke

    Excellent article

    Great to see an IT angle being imposed on the story pre-emptively, presumably y'all at Vulture Central are trying to stay ahead of Fox News...?

    *ducks & runs*

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  8. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    bol oo locks

    "News that the second in line to the throne plans to get married next year is the arguably the biggest celebrity news since Michael Jackson died last year."

    If you ever needed a reason to believe that journos and the media are full of crap? Here it is!

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  9. Christoph

    Maybe they're waiting for a better opportunity

    Perhaps they think they'll do better when the tabloids start running lurid stories about the couple having problems and being likely to split up.

    So, about a week.

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  10. Anonymous Coward
    FAIL

    It'll be like Diana's funeral...

    ... but 20 times worse. I was tired of amazed looks from people who didn't understand why I was annoyed that the country ground to a halt for somebody who really wasn't that special. Bad show giving in to the plebs and flying the flag at half mast. At least one of Diana's sons turned out to be a decent sort of chap, guess that's something.

    With any luck, some MP will spoil the party by being photographed in a compromising position / doing stuff in a club / lying to a jury the day before.

    Yawn.

    It's times like this I almost wish I had joined the Socialist Workers party.

    Almost ;)

    (AC because Diana cultists can be more vitriolic than nitric acid if you even think of blaspheming their idol)

    2 1
  11. Anonymous Coward
    Unhappy

    I did not pick up my royal wedding party bag, before I went home to West Africa

    And as a foreigner person (Barrister) I found your name as a trusted person from business lists here. A diplomatic messenger can deliver it only to address in your country as it contains Royal GOLD coins and I need your kind assistance to receive my rightful gift from HER MAJESTY THE QUEEN. If you, trusting like me in God, will pay only the courier fee of four hundred euros via Western Union Secure Bank then I will split the contents with your, setting aside 12% for expenses.

    Please send fax copy of your passport, mobile telephone number and other ID to

    FBIClaimsOffice-Overinvoicing@mail.cn

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  12. Richard Porter

    What puzzles me

    is how the BBC news site can claim to have "Live" coverage of something that happened a month ago.

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  13. PirateSlayer
    Paris Hilton

    Clifford

    The scariest thing is the amount of effort Max Clifford is putting into capitalising on the overuse of "Kate" and "Katie".

    I have seen Katie 'Thinking Man's Crumpet' Price pop up all over the place. Now that's scareware.

    Doesn't miss a trick that man.

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