Avoid Tech Support Phone Scams

General Discussion Off-Topic
#1

I feel that I should share what I just experienced. I am currently at work and was taken back by what I heard from my wife…

She called me saying that she had a call from Microsoft saying that her computer has been sending malicious information and proceeded to connect to her laptop remotely. I asked her if she gave them her password and she told me no. they were able to connect to her without any authorization. They then proceeded to walk her through some settings that would need to be changed. My wife wasn’t suspicious until they said they could do it for $199. that is when she told me she hung up the phone.

Here is a link from what I googled:

http://www.microsoft.com/security/online-privacy/avoid-phone-scams.aspx

I had my wife unplug our router immediately to stop any remote connectivity to our network. I called our ISP and had them change my IP address. Word to the wise…If you aren’t the only person that can access your home network/internet. This is information you should know and pass along. I get to go home and gut/clean out my laptops that are on my network. I just hope the xbone isn’t affected. :frowning:

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#2

I remember there are some call centers in India that are hired to do all this stuff

#3

LMAO! My wife told me they all sounded like they were from the Middle East. If the shoe fits…!

#4
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#5

This scam has been doing the rounds for a couple of years at least - I’m actually surprised you hadn’t been contacted before now. The scammers probably had your wife turn on remote administration access (or whatever its called). I get spates of calls about every 2-3 months, and I usually tell them something daft like I don’t have windows because I live in a cave. Sometimes, they get very abusive (especially if you tell them you are recording the call and reporting them to the FTC>)

A guy on the Ars Technica web site played along while the scammer poked around in his (sandboxed) Windows virtual machine. In that instance, the scammer not only showed some scary-looking log messages (which are all part of normal windows operation and can be ignored), but went poking around file directories. It appeared he was looking for files containing passwords for bank accounts etc. If your wife keeps a list of passwords for accounts in a word or text file on her computer, CHANGE THEM ALL NOW!

There is no way that anyone could really know that your computer was spewing viruses AND have your phone number. And Microsoft does not call you (they seem to have a hard enough time keeping up with the people who call them!)

Hopefully the scammers didn’t install any back-door or trojan on your wife’s computer either (some of them do and, when triggered, they encrypt all your files and hold you to ransom.) So it would also be a good idea to do a thorough check for malware, and make sure things like Windows Update haven’t been disabled.

Hope everything is fine!

#6

I wouldn’t mind seeing that.

#7

I personally pay no attention to things like this only because I am savvy. My wife is not. I am unaware of how long this has existed. I only want to inform…Anyone with a situation like mine where I’m at work all day and the wife is at home with the kid. :smile:

@JoeKGBX I am pretty sure that the vid above your post is the one you are looking for. :smile:

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#8

Don’t know if they had video or not. The article came out a while back, before the first couple of companies responsible for this got hammered by the FTC. (Which also probably explains why many of the call centres are now in India…)

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#9

Thanks for the vid. Pretty long though. LOL total scam! I like the address part. He’s going to have to call the city on his address. LOL
well, I’m off to clean my laptops. LOL so much fun… :frowning:

#10

They’ve called us a couple of times. We managed to keep them on the phone for over 45 minutes, both times, with my feigned bumbling attempts to start my pc and connect it to the internet. When I got the giggles I’d pass the phone over to my fiance and she’d start all over again. High points include me pretending to fetch a tool box and drop it on my foot- by shaking a kitchen drawer full of cutlery and screaming, and spelling out the word ‘dot’ whenever they tried to get me to type a URL…I wish I’d recorded those calls.

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