If you run Windows on your PC and someone with an Indian accent calls your landline phone claiming to know something about your computer, read on.
Here’s the basic outline of what’s called the “tech support scam”: Someone calls you from an Indian or North American phone number claiming to be a tech support specialist who knows that your machine is infected with a virus. They convince you to open up a command window and type some commands. Those commands allow the scammer to take control of your machine, and then they do something nefarious, like hold you hostage for an outrageous support contract. More here and here if you’re interested.
This scam has apparently been around for a long time. I had one of these calls a few months ago, and it was pretty clear that it had been a random call. The guy knew my name (I’m listed in the directory), but he didn’t know anything else.
Yesterday, I got another call, but the guy knew my Dell service tag number. The service tag is a short alphanumeric code that’s unique to every Dell computer. That’s a pretty powerful piece of information if you’re trying to impersonate a Dell service rep. It should be somewhat confidential – you can’t get my money with it, and you can’t directly hack my machine, but it enables a social engineering scam like my new friend “Bill” with a heavy Indian accent tried yesterday.
This might be a small potatoes scam enabled by Bill’s cousin “Fred” who works at a call center and has lifted a few hundred service tags. Or it might be that someone has hacked Dell and downloaded everyone’s service tag and phone number. Since it doesn’t involve a credit card, we’ll probably never know.
What I do know is that yet another big US corporation has been sloppy and lazy with my personal data, and since it isn’t an enormous Sony- or Target-scale breach, they’ll pay no penalty for it.
leeleeFL
I got the call yesterday! Don’t presently have a PC so sent him packing. WOW!
MattF
I got one of those “Microsoft Technical Support” calls a few months ago. I was tempted to ask him “Does your mother know you call people at random and try to steal from them?” But, wisely I think, I just hung up.
Mustang Bobby
I work with a guy who is Indian, so the first time the scammer called, I said, “Aw, nice try, Vikram! How about lunch tomorrow?”
The second time I told the guy I had an Apple computer, so he switched me over to their Mac guy. He came on and said “What does your screen show?” I replied, “Welcome to Apple IIc.” Click.
Germy Shoemangler
How do these people sleep at night?
J.A.F. Rusty Shackleford
When I was an office manager I used to receive the HP Printer scam calls all the time. I would always ask them why they decided on a life of crime. But not after keeping them in hold for as long as possible “while my assistant gathered the requested serial numbers from all of our machines.” After about 10 mins I would take them off hold and thank them for waiting while our IT got their phone location info from our switch.
Soprano2
I had a message on my answering machine from one of these scammers, I just deleted it. My mother got sucked in by one of them though, she finally got wise and hung up on them but not before she let them get on her machine, she had to take it somewhere to get it fixed. I told her that a legitimate company would never call her like that. I think they particularly prey on older people who are much less certain about how computers work. My mother was worried that there was really something wrong with her computer that these people could help her with.
Germy Shoemangler
One of my old landlines was a combination phone/clock radio/alarm. So during a call, if you put the receiver next to the clock radio, the result would be a piercing feedback SQUEAL. It would continue as long as you held the phone next to the radio.
I confess that, towards the end of my career as a victim of these scammers, I utilized that option.
dnfree
I am randomly getting pop-up windows on my Windows 7 computer using the Chrome browser. They will tell me that Microsoft has detected that I have a virus and to call a phone number for tech support. I have never called the phone number because I know Microsoft doesn’t work that way, but I am curious to know how these windows manage to insinuate themselves. They can’t be closed, and I turn the computer off, but when I restart the browser the tab is still there, with a different message along the same lines. I have to either close that tab before it fully opens, or close it from a different tab. McAfee doesn’t find anything when I do a scan.
gelfling545
An acquaintance who got suckered by this was telling me about it. I guess I just don’t get being taken in by this one – like Microsoft would care if you’ve got a problem and if you do, good luck trying to find a person to talk to, much less to call you personally.
different-church-lady
“BUT ONLY THE GOVERNMENT CAN PUT YOU IN JAIL!” so it’s all good, right?
Jack the Second
@dnfree: It is probably best to report this problem to Chrome. It sounds like a website is exploiting a bug in Chrome to open an un-closeable tab or window.
how to report Chrome issues
how to report phishing sites
DCrefugee
@dnfree:
You have an extension-based infection like I had on this Win7 box. Tried almost everything, which eventually cleaned up most of it. But I had to uninstall Chrome, then reinstall before it all finally went away.
Before doing that, though, try MalwareBytes, Panda and/or SpyHunter. Re-boot often while using malware removers. HTH…
MattF
@gelfling545: Well, y’know, in-real-life when you’ve got a problem with your computer at work, some person you’ve never seen before shows up and takes your computer away to fix it. Maybe there’s a learned response that makes sort of thing acceptable or expected.
ChrisH
@dnfree: If these pop-ups you’re getting can’t seem to be closed and appear whenever you open chrome, it sounds like you have some Mal-ware on your system. I had one of these once where it was trying to convince me to purchase a phony antivirus program to fix the supposed problem. It would keep informing me of so many viruses detected and then would randomly open porn sites in my browser for good measure.
I would start by googling any identifiable bits, such as the phone number they ask you to call. There may be a tech support forum with instructions on how to remove that particular bit of malware.
MattF
@dnfree: One thing to watch out for is logging in to any site that has personal information about you. Assuming you’ve got some sort of malware infection, there’s a good chance you’ve also got a keylogger watching what you type.
ChrisH
I have received several of these spam phone calls on my cell phone. On the last one I told the Indian rep that my computer doesn’t have a keyboard and everything is controlled by a giant Ipod wheel and said I was about to dial in, then started yelling “Ooooeeeeeoooeoooooooweeeooweee” into the phone to simulate me connecting to my dialup
jeffreyw
I get the Microsoft Tech Support scammers calling fairly often. I tell them that after the last phone call warning of a virus I took my machine and dug a hole in the backyard, poured gasoline over it and burned it to kill the virus. Do your scans still see viral activity, I ask? I guess I’d better burn it again because Ebola! and ask them to call me back if they see the infection recur. I thank them profusely and hang up.
Tinare
My mother recently went into a nursing home and so I’ve been at her house a lot working to get it ready to sell. I got one of these calls while I was there and I was so glad that she didn’t get it because at 92 she couldn’t handle very much and certainly didn’t understand computers. The only saving grace is that, since she has been slowly going blind, she had given the computer she had to her younger sister last year and so it was easy to say, “I know this is a scam because we don’t have a computer.” I may have added a shame on you for preying on the elderly, but the guy hung up and I don’t think he heard me.
C.V. Danes
The best policy with your computer is to trust no one.
D58826
I’ve gotten a couple of those calls. Just for the fun of it I would string him along for a bit. One time I told him I had a commodore 64. The next time I played dumb about the operating system and then finally said, as if the light was going on, ‘Oh I see, I don’t use windows I use doors’. He hung up rather quickly
dw
I’ve gotten numerous calls. Sometimes up to 3-4 times a day. I’ve gotten to a point where I put the receiver down and let them talk until they realize no one is there. Last year I had to live with my elderly father. Same thing up there. He doesn’t have a computer. When I told the guy this, he hung up. After the third call I cut loose with quite a few obscenities. Didn’t matter they kept calling back.
Botsplainer
I keep a thumb drive with a clean copy of Malwarebites on it that I update regularly. In terms of the command sequence, if I forget, I can call the office IT contractor to talk me through it, and I’m not down for days.
I’ve only had to do that once since a few episodes occurred about 5 years ago.
Dupe70
HP has the issue as well. This comes partially from outsourcing to Indian call centers. People in the call center gather information and either quit and join the scammers or funnel information to the scammers.
Lurker
Had one of those calls a few months ago. Smelled a rat and promptly hung up on the caller.
WaterGirl
@dnfree: Get yourself some anti-malware software, which is different from anti-virus software like McAfee. I use Malwarebytes.
Edit: I see that about a hundred people already said this. You should take our collective advice.
Villago Delenda Est
@Germy Shoemangler: Might as well ask the same question about Franklin Graham, or Sarah Palin, or Kkkarl Rove.
They’re all ethics-free scum.
tesslibrarian
We haven’t had a Windows box in our house in nearly 20 years, and we get these calls. My one exchange with him as I sat in front of my Mac (which was running a VM box with Ubuntu at the time):
Scam Caller: Your Microsoft machine is downloading an infection from the Internet.
Me: How did it get a virus?
SC: Not a virus, an infection.
Me: So there are bacteria AND viruses on the Internet?
SC: Yes, ma’m.
At which point, I just started laughing and hung up. We haven’t received many of these calls since the beginning of the year, but they called about 3x/week over the summer.
Bill ORLY
I got one of these calls a couple of months ago. I played along, asking increasingly dumber and dumber questions. He actually got his “manager” on the line who I also strung along for a while. The guy was getting obviously frustrated/pissed with me, and kept saying “I don’t believe you are asking me this!” He finally hung up on me.
Villago Delenda Est
@different-church-lady: Eventually, the invisible hand will slap these guys something fierce.
Eventually.
rk
I’ve had this happen to me along with numerous other scams. All with Indian accents (scamming seems like a mini industry there). I got one saying there was an arrest warrant out for me from the Federal govt and I should turn myself in to the local police or call some number (where no doubt I’d have been asked to hand over some money). Then there was one telling me I owed the IRS money and should call some number to sort it all out. I know someone who actually sent a $1000 dollars to the scammers. Plus I got the “your computer has a virus and let me help fix it for you” scam.
This is apparently very common since our neighborhood association keeps sending out information on the latest version of the scam. The new thing is that they’ve managed to recruit people with authentic American accents (or maybe locals have got in on the action).
But beware the tax scam, it’s very easy to fall for it.
japa21
Been getting these calls a lot over the past several months. At least once a week for about 2 months then they tailed off.
I would always call back the number and it was always a number owned by Verizon or ATT or someone which was not in service. Always wondered how that worked.
Normally I would just hang up but finally, one time I asked the caller, who happened to be female, how she could sleep at night knowing she was trying to defraud people. Her response was a succinct “Go fuck yourself” and she hung up.
rlrr
@dnfree:
You are infected with malware. Check your programs/features and uninstall any recent programs you don’t recognize. Uninstall any unrecognized extensions from Chrome. Get a good anti-virus program (I’m currently trying out ESET’s NOD32). I used to believe Microsoft’s Security Essentials was sufficient (this used to be the case), but not anymore, especially if you have multiple users on your computer.
Also – NEVER SURF THE WEB LOGGED INTO AN ACCOUNT WITH ADMIN PRIVILEGES unless you really know what you’re doing.
And NEVER download software form download.com, try to find the original source. Download.com bundles otherwise safe software with nasty malware.
jeff
We get these calls all the time and make sport of it. I like to keep interrupting the pitch until the guy gets flustered. Then I promise to stop if he’ll repeat back to me some demeaning statement I dream up on the fly. My wife likes to actually sit at the computer for these calls. She stalls until she has a talking translator window open and can put the phone to the speaker so the computer can ask if this is a scam, in Hindi. Dude got so mad HE hung up on HER and called back a few minutes later to tell her to suck his dick. Flawless victory.
Hunter
@J.A.F. Rusty Shackleford: I used to get those when I worked as a receptionist. I just told them “Nice try” and hung up.
rlrr
I got one of these call a few weeks ago. She said there was unusual activity from a Windows computer coming from my IP address. I told her I have no Windows machine – CLICK.
Next time I’m going to ask whoever to tell me on which IP address they’re seeing this activity…
Neddy Merrill
I never, yeah never, answer the phone from an unknown number. If they leave a message I’ll listen but that rarely happens.
David in NY
Clue — never ever give someone cold-calling you information. Ask them how you can obtain service from Dell (or whoever) on the official Dell website. You must initiate the contact or you’re giving all your information (and potentially money) away.
I get these calls fairly regularly. Never imagined it was a malware placement operation — just knew it was all BS. Would call the attorney general about them if I had enough info.
Roger Moore
@Villago Delenda Est:
Yeah, they’ll get slapped with a big roll of $100s.
David in NY
@dnfree: Re: random pop-ups.
I had this problem and concluded that no one really knew how this worked. But one possibility was a corrupted modem (or router). I finally made them stop by replacing my modem and increasing security on it (not using standard “admin” user name, or machine installed password, or something).
@ChrisH: The pop-ups I got were like the ones ChrisH got — but I managed never to click on them and could get rid of them.
BobS
@Bill ORLY: I had some fun several years ago fucking with a scammer who was trying to convince me I’d won a huge Publishers Clearing House prize – of course, my winning was predicated on my calling back and sharing personal information. I’d act excited and elated while talking with ‘Bill’ (whose accent was pretty similar to Nigerians I work with) and copy the call-back number but never call back. When Bill would call again I’d read a deliberately jumbled call-back number, copy the number again and promise to call right back. After four calls they (because after several calls, in an attempt to either convince me of the legitimacy of their scam or finally land the fish they thought they’d hooked, I was transferred to Bill’s colleague ‘Steve’ who was supposedly at the number I was supposed to call back & who spoke with a similar accent) finally realized I was fucking with them, Bill called me a “fool” and hung-up for good.
Hunter
@WaterGirl: I have both MalwareBytes and Webroot anti-virus (which seems to be pretty effective). I got the MalwareBytes after falling victim to malware that started sending out bugged e-mails to my address book and also crashed the review site I edit by trying multiple log-ins with my username.
No problems since, and they both scan automatically at least once a day.
As for calls from “service reps” — I’ve not gotten them, but I screen calls anyway and only answer calls from real people — and if they’re not family or friends, they’d better ask for me by name and state why they’re calling.
Ben Cisco
@J.A.F. Rusty Shackleford: The printer scam guys are still out there. They’ve taken to calling all over my building, trying to talk to anyone EXCEPT the IT department. I have my peeps trained to xfer all such calls to me. After a couple of verbal beatdowns, the (relatively) smart ones give up. The hardheaded ones get handed over to my Number One, who has truly turned trolling these guys into an Olympic sport. Hilarity ensues, for us anyway.
MomSense
I’ve gotten the IRS scam calls, Microsoft scam calls, and toner pirate calls. My spam box is full of some really interesting solicitations.
Grumpy Code Monkey
Got one of these calls shortly after having read an Ars Technica article about it, so I was ready. My home system is Linux, not Windows, so I happily typed in the commands he gave me and read off the results, which were mostly messages like “command not found”. The rising frustration in his voice was delicious, until he eventually decided I wasn’t worth the effort and hung up.
Gex
@Germy Shoemangler: Honestly? Our global economic system produces as few jobs as it can, grudgingly, and pays as little as it can. Leaving many people with a need to find a way to make a living. How many do this by choice rather than necessity is hard to say. Give everyone a shot at a decent paying job with some security and then see how much of this is horrible people.
Not justifying scamming people or anything, it’s just that we ALL know we are in a system that supports the notion of surplus population that should just go away. There’s got to be ton of the callers and I bet they just get paid a little for each machine they manage to infect, with the big proceeds going to whomever is running the ring.
To answer your question, I’m going to guess with a roof over their heads and food in their bellies.
Gravenstone
My stepfather (who likely couldn’t operate a computer if held at gunpoint) got one of these calls. Guy claimed his computer had a “bug”. Stepfather replied, “no, it had diarrhea, but we git it fixed back up.” I honestly never would have thought he had it in him.
Germy Shoemangler
@MomSense: I don’t see them here, but most websites with comments, the comments section quickly fills up with stuff like “I agree with Gary! And also, my sister after losing her job, made $5000 last week from just a few hours on her computer! Click here to find out more!” etc.
I suppose people actually are following those linked and getting scammed? Otherwise this stuff would go away?
dexwood
@rlrr:
This. I know from experience. Thought for sure I was at Spotify. It looked like the genuine site, but it was download.com and it installed very nasty malware called Vosteron that could not be eliminated by an extremely competent pro. It hijacked every web site I visited placing ads everywhere. He had no choice, after three attempts to clean it out, but to “go nuclear”. as he said, and do a complete wipe and re-install of my operating system. After the first attempt to eliminate the malware, he was positive it was clean. Brought the PC home, fired it up, first place I went to on my favorites list reactivated the deeply buried malware. Fortunately for me, all further attempts and the wipe/re-install were covered by my first, reasonable payment/warranty. He lost money on this deal, I’m sure, but he stood by his word and his work. The PC works great again, very fast, and remains clean. I upgraded Malwarebytes to the purchase plan. too.
rlrr
@dexwood:
If there’s any doubt, the nuclear option is the only solution. Which is why backups are so important…
MattF
Sorta on topic– some years ago Daniel Davies wrote an interesting post on the economics of Nigerian 419 spamming that probably applies here as well:
http://blog.danieldavies.com/2002/10/dial-419-for-fun-along-with-shrill.html
dexwood
@rlrr:
Fortunately for me, I had backed up about two weeks before getting hit by the malware.
rlrr
@dexwood:
The fuckers at download.com (and CNET) will claim they don’t serve malware, since they bury in their user agreement, that you agree to let CNET fuck up your computer.
Kay (not the front-pager)
@Germy Shoemangler: This, essentially, is what I ask them when they call me.
My son and I had a (text) conversation about this yesterday. He sent me a link to a story on arstechnica about a scammer who threatened to kill the scammee when he was called on the scam.
Coincidentally, I got another of these calls just a few minutes ago. My strategy is to interrupt as soon as I know it is this scam, offer sympathy about how hard it is to find legitimate jobs, but that they don’t need to cheat old people out of their savings and that by doing this their immortal soul is at risk. I continue in this vein until they hang up, which usually happens pretty quickly. Today I added the phrase, “You are better than this” several times because the immortal soul wasn’t having its usual effect (the immortal soul line usually is what brings silence).
I wish there were some way to block them, but they always use a different, spoofed phone number (sometimes my own!) so I never know it’s them until I answer. I get enough calls from unknown numbers that I need to take that I can’t just refuse to answer calls I don’t recognize.
Germy Shoemangler
Here’s an example of a more subtle scam/spam:
A few years ago a guy I went to college with, a successful advertising exec, launched a new business. I won’t say the name, but it provided a service to pharm companies to expand their advertising into social media. He recently sold his stake for a nice sum. He said they have about 50 employees. He was vague about how exactly he got his pharm clients to sell on social media, but here’s what a friend told me:
His elderly father was prescribed medication. The old guy loved google; in his career he had been a researcher, so he loved digging for information. He was worried about side-effects, so he’d google his medication and end up on message boards.
Every single message board has comments from people who were obviously fronting for the pharm company. Sometimes the other commenters would call them out on this, because they were so obvious about it: “I tried [medication x] and it worked like a miracle! Try it!”
The old man was just trying to find honest opinions about the drug. And he had to wade through marketers disguised as impartial commenters.
Perfectly legal, and more subtle than the nigerian scammers and telemarketing frauds, but harmful in its own way.
beergoggles
I’m just curious how or what gave you the impression that the manufacturer service code is somehow a secure identification of your machine. If anyone finds your computer name or IP address they can find your service tag:
wmic /node:[remote computer name] bios get serialnumber
Violet
Knowing the Dell service tag number is concerning. But in general when I get those calls I play really dumb. Tell them I’m so glad they called, I’ve been having so many problems with my computer. Then I pretend I’m completely unable to find the buttons they want me to push. I ask them what the cup holder is in the computer and why can’t I get it to stay open all the time. I “accidentally” turn the computer off. I make them wait quite a few minutes between each thing they request. Just keep toying with them. Eventually they hang up and I’ve had some fun.
Mnemosyne (tablet)
@gelfling545:
Ironically, people may find these scams plausible because of credit card fraud. There have been a couple of times where my bank called me to alert me to some potentially fraudulent activity on my account, so people may naively think their computer company would do the same thing.
Germy Shoemangler
@Violet: Not only that, but you’ve wasted their time, which is money to them. The more you can engage them, the less time they have to snag someone who can be fooled.
I remember reading about someone who would call in to all the televangelists, and keep their operators busy with nonsense, hoping it would cut into their profit margin.
gelfling545
@MattF: Well, yes but after you’ve called them & asked them to do so. They don’t just go door to door.
Cain
That shit never works for me. I run Linux on my machine and any asshole who tries to do that would only get a sneering, holy than thou, dudemeister to deal with.
BTW, I’ve had that and I totally know it is a scam. When I tell them I run Linux, they are so totally confused!
J R in WV
I also use Linux, and have never had a problem with any kind of malware. In the beginning it sometimes required my professional skillz along with advice from google and forums about the OS and managing things.
But the last couple of releases (now at Ubuntu 14.04 LTS) have been pretty rock solid, automatic updates have worked OK, it just works. Not very different from what I recall from Windows of years ago. I also use Android on a nice tablet when traveling, very sweet.
Have had my hands on an Apple laptop, while visiting a cousin, since I only used a browser I can’t really judge the diff between Apple OS and Linux/Ubuntu.
Violet
@Germy Shoemangler: Yep. I feel like I’m doing everyone else a favor.
A few years ago the guys were incessant about calling. They’d call about every fifteen minutes from a different number. If I’d hang up on them, they’d call back again. Incredibly annoying. That’s when I came up with the plan to toy with them. I guess it got me off the list because they haven’t called back since.
Egypt Steve
The free market will take care of this.
Grumpy Code Monkey
@J R in WV:
Give it time. Gven how big Linux is on the server side, I’m sure there’s quite a bit of Linux-targeted malware already out there. You just may not see it unless you run a web server or something similar on your box.
LongHairedWeirdo
“What is the netbios name?” is a good check for anyone claiming to know anything about your computer. Most of the callers don’t even know what that is. But anyone who had any network connectivity to a windows machine would know the netbios name.
(Right click on “computer”/”My Computer”, under “properties”, the main page includes information about about your computer’s name (=NetBIOS name) and domain/workgroup name).)
I did have fun with one of them, however, who *clearly* never had a younger brother. I just started repeating everything he said.
“Hello sir.”
“Hello sir.”
“There is a problem with your windows computer.”
“There is a problem with your windows computer.”
“Why are you repeating my words?”
“Why are you repeating my words?”
“Would you please stop doing this?”
“Would you please stop doing this?”
Long pause.
“I am an idiot”
“I knew that! DUH!” (hangs up.)
ThresherK
@dexwood: Haven’t seen that one but it reminds me of Conduit. Anyone know which is worse?
beergoggles
I installed ubuntu (linux) for a friend of mine and several months later he was complaining how slow his network was. Turned out someone was using it to serve up zero day warez.
So unless you are heavily monitoring your linux box processes and traffic you may be quite unaware as to how vulnerable or compromised you are.
dexwood
@ThresherK:
My IT guy said it was a new one for him, he had never seen it before. He did some research and considered it a learning experience, now knows what to look for. When i picked up my PC from him for the final time he told me two other PCs with the same problem were dropped off the day before.
kindness
I love my Apple computers. Macs cost more but are worth every penny.
Bwwaahhaahaaahaa.
ThresherK
@dexwood: Well, it’s bad that it’s happened, but there’s something to be said for not being the proverbial last sucker on the block.
I have a friend or two who will fall for something after it’s reached cliche status. No Nigerian prince scam has tricked them. Yet.
dexwood
@kindness:
Gloating is so. . . unkind. Just kidding with you.
Sloegin
I’ve gotten calls from the Windows chappies several times now. The latest one I’ve gotten this week is the IRS lawsuit scammers.
Best of luck to those guys, because the IRS fraud unit might be slow, but they’ll be hunted down and dispatched eventually. Don’t screw around with the IRS.
kathy a.
I work at home, and over the years have gotten probably north of a dozen “windows service center” calls like the ones you describe. But never with detailed information on my machine — that’s horrifying.
hells littlest angel
This scam can be run by people of any ethnicity. Imagine if you’d said that recently there had been a lot of campus rapes committed by black men.
gbear
I’ve gotten that call probably two dozen times already. I usually hang up as the guy is saying he’s from ‘microsoft offices’. I actually listened to him for a half minute last week and he spent the time practically begging for me to not hang up. I’ve always wondered what the call is about and I’m glad to see this today. Thanks CM.
Tokyokie
When I get a call like that saying, “Hello, my name is Margaret, and I’m with SuchandSuch,” I reply, “No, your name isn’t Margaret, and you’re not with SuchandSuch, and why should I believe anything further that you say?” They usually hang up on me before I can hang up on them.
drkrick
An ex-colleague kept a printer scammer on the phone for about 10 minutes trying to source “print pellets” for our “Bonaparte 1000” copier, which was “the latest in French copier technology” back in the ’80’s. One of the fonder memories of that job.
Mike G
I got one of these calls.
I know it’s a scam but I act all eager, tell them I have two computers so which IP address are they calling about? He made up a generic private IP like 192.168.1.2.
I tell him, “Hold on, let me go boot up my computer and I’ll be right with you,” then put him on hold while I went outside for a stroll. Five minutes later when I picked up again, they’d hung up. No calls since.
Real tech support would wait on the line, a scammer will dump a slow-moving call and move on to an easier target.
catclub
@beergoggles: How? details? What processes should I look for?
catclub
@Grumpy Code Monkey:
What is the MO for malware getting access if you are NOT running a server? ssh? http? pdf/adobe?
JaneE
@Mike G: I have had several of these. I kept one “tech” on the line for about 5 minutes, pretending to be following their instructions. (this was the one where they “find” a MS utility program on your computer as if it were malware, and then have you run a MS utility to show some error log, which always has errors, to scare you into buying their “cleanup”) I got to the point where I was supposed to delete something, then dropped the phone and hung up. Someone called me about 4 times in a row right after that, but didn’t leave a message. At least I had fun, and wasted some of their time too.
Proto Thad
I got one of those a while back. Had a real interesting
time trying to get the guy to explain how a Windows virus
had managed to infect my Linux computer. I was tempted to
fire up a disposable virtual PC and see what they would do
but ultimately did not have the time to play. Maybe next
time.
TriassicSands
There’s no way a Dell technician will ever initiate a call to a Dell computer owner. Dell simply doesn’t care enough about their customers to volunteer to help them. I’ve had Dell computers for almost two decades and the level of technical and customer support today is but a faint shadow of what it was in the mid-nineties. Improving support, technical or other, doesn’t seem to have been a goal of Michael Dell’s when he took the company private in 2013.
I’ve been running Linux for some time now, and there are no viruses in the wild that affect Linux. If I got such a scam call, I’d be tempted to string them along for as long as possible — wasting their time — before shutting them down. Scam the scammer. (And, if you’re new to Linux and have a Dell computer, don’t bother calling Dell technical support to ask for help with Linux. They won’t help you. Some years back, Dell actually was willing to sell and ship computers with Linux installed.
HeartlandLiberal
Fascinating read at link below. He scams the scammers with an isolated, network connected machine, to see just what the scam is. At the end, he confronts them, and they continue to claim legitimacy. Unrepentant criminals.
What amazes me is how people can still fall for this?
http://www.troyhunt.com/2012/02/scamming-scammers-catching-virus-call.html
I sent the link to this post here on this blog to friend who is Dell rep for the state university I retired from, so she could pass it on. That the caller had a Dell service tag associated with an identity should have them auditing their systems fast.
As for online security, I despair. My credit union mastercard was hacked / exposed AGAIN, second time in three months, two weeks ago. I now have three from the credit union, one for carrying, one for online bill pays, and one for online shopping, so I spread my risk, and limit damage next time one of them is hacked. Also moving all ACH check pays online to a limited business checking account, and only moving enough bucks in to pay bills that are triggered. Removing all references to our primary checking account from the Internet as fast as possible.
We learned that Cruise Planners was hacked, right about the time we paid for our European cruise upcoming with the card. How special.
AndoChronic
This asshat is a fucktard. Before I got my call blocker I used to dress-him-down until he could only stutter.
henqiguai
@hells littlest angel (#72):
I’ve been getting those calls (the Microsoft service center scam) for a few years, and always, *always*, it is an Indian male or female. So while it may be run by anyone, I’ve only had callers with stereotypically heavy Indian accents. But your opprobrium is noted.
smintheus
@leeleeFL: I was always respond “I don’t know what you’re talking about, I don’t own a computer. Where did you get the idea that I do?”
tavella
I’ve been getting calls from another scam call center lately, likely also located in India from the comments when I looked up the numbers. They started with fake numbers, but sad for them, if I don’t recognize the number it generally goes to voice mail. Then they went to using private numbers, but sad for them, I have an app that blocks those from even ringing. But from the log they went from every other day to twice a day to 3 or 4 times a day.
Apparently the guys at this one get sexually abusive if the target pushes back.
beergoggles
@catclub: well in that case it was running an ftp service that I obv did not install on it and neither did he. Doing a netstat can show all the port connections – you should be able to tell which ones look suspicious when you’re not using the machine for anything but there are still connections.
Ultimately reconfiguring the router for port forwarding instead of just sticking the machine in the dmz was a better solution for me because I did not want to be constantly nagged for support.
Either way, if ur running linux, keep an eye on your processes, drive space and open ports.
Avery Greynold
Some people seem happy that they’ve made them hang up quickly. I consider it best to extend the call as long as possible. As long as the talk, they or their employers are losing money. Enough people keep them busy, the costs will exceed the rewards. Yes, it is taking your time. Consider it a public service to deter criminals. Karma will owe you.
kvmj
Anti-virus isn’t always enough. Here are 2 free programs that should solve the problem; http://superantispyware.download-pc-software.com/ Install and run. No computer should be without http://www.malwarebytes.org/
I’ve had so many calls, I recognize their voices. One of them recognizes mine. I used to be able to keep him on the phone forever.
catclub
@beergoggles: Thanks! I have set up my gateway router (AT&T) to only allow ssh and http, so I think I am ok. (I turned on bit-torrent while I got what I wanted, then turned that back off.)
dimmsdale
Sounds like a splendid opportunity to re-purpose Bob & Ray’s old “Slow talkers of America” routine.
“I…………have……………a…………virus……….on my……………..computer?…………….Oh………………..dear……………Can………….you……………help………..me?”
Gus
@leeleeFL: Yeah, I’ve had this call a few times. We’re an all Mac home, so I tell them that. Last time I just said “don’t call me again.”
Geetar59
@jeffreyw:That’s what I did, too! I said that I was so concerned about viruses that I had buried the computer in the back yard. The scammer, either none-too-bright or struggling with language difficulties, kept trying to tell me that there was a problem with my “Windows computer”. I eventually hung up.
Theodore Wirth
If perhaps you get an unsolicited call from Gareth at Worldwide Technical Support, hang up and eat another cookie.
Roberta in MN
You have to go into the settings and see who overrides your internet options. Browser. It shows up actually when you go into IE, Firefox or whatever. You have to delete that and put your actual browser site back in and restart your computer. Does this help?
JGabriel
mistermix @ top:
I’ve gotten maybe 4 or 5 of these calls over the past few years. I always laugh derisively and heartily, yell out with enthusiasm, “I work in tech. This is a scam! You’re a scammer!”
They usually hang up at that point, although a couple of them carried on and tried to continue convincing me there was really a virus on my computer – at which point I hung up on them.
JGabriel
Question for the various Linux users out there: What distros are you running?
I’ve got a multi-boot machine running Mint 17.1 and Win 10 Beta. I keep intending to do the full switch to Linux but have never found a distro I’m completely comfortable with. So far I’ve tried: Slackware, Manjaro, Crunchbang, Ubuntu, Puppy, Mint, Hybryde, Suse, Porteus, Elementary, Bodhi, WattOS, Zorin, most of the *buntu’s, etc., etc., and so on
Crunchbang was probably the one I liked best – but there hasn’t been a new release since 2013 and they’ve ended development – followed by Suse.
I’ve been thinking of trying Archbang. Or maybe rolling my own Open Box desktop from Arch, Debian, Gentoo, or LFS (Linux From Scratch) – though I’m not entirely sure I want to put that much time into it.
So what Linuxes (Linii?) and/or Desktop Environments are you people using on your home machines and why do you prefer that distro to the others?
dopey-o
@JGabriel: BLOCKQUOTE>So what Linuxes (Linii?) and/or Desktop Environments are you people using on your home machines and why do you prefer that distro to the others?
Tails is based on NSA Linux. I gar-on-teee you will not need anti-virus or anti-malware! And you can run it disguised as Windows XP! Fun!
JGabriel
You know, I’ve downloaded TAILS – which, btw, means I’m probably on some sort of NSA watch list, since they allegedly monitor everyone who downloads it – but I’ve never installed it. (I’m not sure I believe the thing about NSA monitoring the people/IP addresses that dl TAILS, but just in case: YOU HEAR THAT NSA? NEVER. INSTALLED. IT.)
Anyway, it just seemed like the security on it was so heavy that it would be really intrusive to use it, and/or a pain in the ass to actually get any work done on it. Has that been your experience, or are the security protocols/blocks/etc. relatively unintrusive ?
Fred Fnord
@Mustang Bobby: The one and only time I got one of these calls, I did a really bad old-man imitation, told him I didn’t have a computer I had a Microsoft, and when after a bit of back and forth he asked me what was on my screen I told him that it was a picture of my ‘skinny white behind’. I had to rephrase it a couple of times before he figured out what it meant, which kind of ruined the effect. But I still giggle every once in a while when I think of the phrase ‘behind what?’
wooflikeabear
@catclub: Umm.. allowing ssh through port forwarding may not be the best choice unless u installed 2 factor authentication on it – you can even use google’s authenticator for it.
cbear
I received several of these calls, and figuring the guy(s) were either Hindu, Muslim or Christian, I told them to “Eat a bacon-cheese burger and blow me.”
I hoped that would adequately insult them whatever their background/religion.