The Ugly: Fake Tech Support Calls
You're quite savvy when it comes to computer security, right? You keep your antivirus & other software updated, only surf using HTTPS and never install anything even remotely fishy on your computer.
Maybe that's why our close enemies the scammers are using another method of leeching off money from unwitting computer users: the good old telephone. It seems they’ve found unwitting marks in people who grew up answering phones instead of tweets, most of whom are not up to speed on technology as the rest of us.Microsoft did some digging into this:The Trustworthy Computing Team conducted a survey of 7,000 people, and found that more than 1,000 people had received calls. Of those 1,000 people, 22 percent of people fell for the scam (234 people total), and 184 of those lost money - on average, more than $800.
Ouch. Let me give you a brief rundown on how they do their dirty work:
- They call you up and tell you that your computer is sending error messages and they’ve come to fix that for you. They’ll also say they’re from a trusted institution like Microsoft or a local phone company. (Frankly, I’m surprised they would even care to call you; it’s so out of character!)
- The scammer will walk you through installing remote control software like LogMeIn to be able to take full control of your computer. Your spider sense should be tingling already at this point.
- Once he’s behind the wheel, he’ll take you for a ride by installing nasty malware like keyloggers and fake antivirus software.
- He’ll then proceed to “clean” this up for you, charging you both for the installation as well as the “service”, a double whammy.
- Now that they have your credit card number, they can wreck all sort of havoc. And to add insult to injury, with the remote software that they’ve installed in your computers, they can now also steal other important data from you later on.
Suffice it to say that this entire thing leaves a really bitter taste in my mouth and so I wanted to write about it to help spread the word.
Remember: you will never receive a legitimate call from Microsoft or their partners to charge you for computer fixes.
To help put a stop to this completely report them to SANS through this form as well. And please do share this article to your friends, parents, neighbors and grandpas, the more people who know, the better!
