Fun with tech support

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A nice fellow from India (?) called and offered to help me clean up my computer since it was sending hundreds of error messages to the server. I kept him occupied for about 20 minutes including 3 callbacks by having problems following his directions and the phone line “dropping”. In the past they only call back once, but this guy was persistent!

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A friend of mine had a call from these guys last night. I happened to be at her house, so she handed me the phone. I asked him how he knew that her computer was having so many problems. He said that he could see it on his computer. I told him that he shouldn’t be spying on her computer like that, and that there is no way we would trust someone who spied on her computer. I told him I was glad that we talked to him for the time we did, because that kept him from being able to scam someone else. I then hung up.

Group "L" (Linux Mint)
with Windows 10 running in a remote session on my file server

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The calls are short when I ask how that applies to my Macintosh or Linux computers which actually are running at the time. Some time when convenient I will “entertain” the caller with the irritating Phone Off Hook sound I recorded on my Cellphone and converted to .mp3.

Before you wonder "Am I doing things right," ask "Am I doing the right things?"

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Hello mrjimphelps:

For the benefit of all readers, and we know you may not have thought about it at the time, it would be helpful to get the phone number, name of the company, and if volunteered, the URL of their website.

HTH

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Hello mrjimphelps:

For the benefit of all readers, and we know you may not have thought about it at the time, it would be helpful to get the phone number, name of the company, and if volunteered, the URL of their website.

HTH

I wasn’t interested in asking them for that info, I was interested only in telling them that they were scumbags.

Besides, the next time they would have a different name, number, and URL.

Group "L" (Linux Mint)
with Windows 10 running in a remote session on my file server

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I also enjoy keeping these people on the phone to waste their time. I’ve only been cursed at once :). I’m actually very polite–I basically do what they tell me, until I’m uncomfortable with it and question them every step of the way.

For those who care, one of them told me to go to: ammyy dot com and click on a link there (said he was with Tech Help Line).
Another caller said he was from Support IT Tech and online, the phone number was associated with “tbay services” and “supportittech.”

I have noticed that these guys have become a lot more persistent this year. One caller tried for 5 minutes to convince me that clicking a link on the website above was safe. He said, “If we were going to do something to you, we would have done it already.” Not convincing.

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1PW,

The phone numbers are usually spoofed through Skype or similar.

Zig

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Hi Zig:

I don’t disagree. Getting the phone number out to the Internet gives us the ability to warn others even if it lasts only a few hours.

Thank you.

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Hi Zig:

I don’t disagree. Getting the phone number out to the Internet gives us the ability to warn others even if it lasts only a few hours.

Thank you.

I recommend two search sites for those curious about investigating “strange” phone numbers:
I often report phone numbers on 800notes.com and I check mycallbot.com for a quick search of a number.

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I get these calls frequently, and I just say “the gentleman from the Bureau of Investigation is right here, we have been expecting your call.” They hang up immediately.

How is it that a teenager from a third-world country working alone in a basement can penetrate the computer systems of the worlds largest financial and industrial organizations, but none of our computer experts can penetrate the guys behind these calls? (Sigh.)

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How is it that a teenager from a third-world country working alone in a basement can penetrate the computer systems of the worlds largest financial and industrial organizations, but none of our computer experts can penetrate the guys behind these calls? (Sigh.)

The large institutions that have been hacked aren’t always willing to spend the money, hire/retain the necessary specialists, nor maintain ongoing training for those whose responsibility it is to protect these systems and the critical data they possess. For some of these conglomerates, financial losses due to hackers are simply the cost of doing business and ultimately may become a tax write-off or are factored in the increasing price of their goods or services you ultimately pay for.

IMHO, an excellent example is the debacle behind the 40 million credit card breach at Target Corp. last December where the alleged HVAC company that may have facilitated the break-in, may have possibly supplied their employee’s computers with the free/consumer version of Malwarebytes Anti-Malware as their source of computer protection.

Hackers are very intelligent and we will always be playing a catch-up game against them. They routinely use their intelligence, TOR, and good encryption to cover their unlawful efforts in world regions where they are sometimes publicly celebrated as local heroes.

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I might add that the first time he called the phone number was identified as technical support. When he called back 3 times the call showed no caller ID or number. I’m pretty sure the first number was a spoof. Later in the day a women called on the same topic. I kept her on for a short while. But she never called back.

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I might add that the first time he called the phone number was identified as technical support. When he called back 3 times the call showed no caller ID or number. I’m pretty sure the first number was a spoof. Later in the day a women called on the same topic. I kept her on for a short while. But she never called back.

Mine came in with no number whatsoever just “unknown” so it’s obviously spoofed.

Don't take yourself so seriously, no one else does
All W10 Pro at 22H2,(2 Desktops, 1 Laptop).

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