Phonecalls from "microsoft"

[bigTillyMint]

We have had several calls from men purporting to be from Microsoft - ringing to take us through stopping a pop-up which appears (something about logger and running script... but which disappears when you click yes)

Tonight he took my DH through a procedure, but my DH stopped - worried that there was something dodgy about this.

The guy said he got our number from when we recently bought the PC.

Anyone else got any experience of this?

It's a scam - they are trying to get you to install spyware.

Your number would not be known by the store that sold you the PC and Microsoft do not have telephone operatives chasing down people with viruses on their computers.

I strongly suggest your DH runs an antispyware program and also a virus check and does not give out any information if they call again.

Also, did you not think to ask them for the purchase date and the location the PC was purchased from?

I had a call recently from "Computer Support" who rambled on about my PC having a problem and they wanted me to run something. Very strange. However, they stopped in their tracks when I said I was running Linux and not Windows. I basically told them to "go away" in no uncertain terms. Has to be bogus call imo.

I always say I haven't got a computer.

Its a scam. Microsoft will never call you. They charge you a premium rate to call them when you do have an issue.

It might (although I am not sure) place a key logger on your machine so that they can get passwords and things. The scammers, not Microsoft, I mean!

www.techeye.net/security/microsoft-scam-comes-to-a-phone-near-you

There's a lot of it about - definitely a scam. They'll either get you to go to a website which will download dodgy stuff onto your PC (keyloggers etc to get your passwords and account details) and/or convince you that you have a problem with your PC and need to buy their "fix".

Microsoft never call you up - you have to phone them on a premium rate line to have any hope of speaking to their people.

HTH!

Oh and they call us all the time - we are totally Mac. We laugh at them and tell us we are opening windows, then complain that it's cold with the windows open etc.

They appear to be an indian company. They are not very clever either, reading from the same script each time. We take it in turns to taunt them

I feel a bit sorry for them, they are doing a shit job. But they are also in the pay of criminals and know it, so...

You need to have your pc looked at by a pro as you probably have inadvertently installed a back door program which allows the scammers access to your pc whenever they want. Malware detection software may not pick it up.

MIL had a call from someone wanting her credit card number to pay for a subscription to the 'anti virus' software they wanted to install.

this happened to my brother, they depend I think on the fact that if you are running Windows you would have probably had these errors. So they try to get you to loet them connect remotely.

Then they try to get you to give you your credit card number so they can support you in the future.

If you ask for a number to call back they won't give you one. My brother didn't have a credit card at that time, but they persisted in trying to get money from him. Until he talked to me

So, in short it's a big scam, if you've already given them remote access you need to disable it:

Control Panel
System
Remote
make sure it's not clicked to allow remote access

This was on our Welsh version of Watchdog last night.

It's a scam.

Well done for not falling for it.

The basic advice was that if anyone unexpected calls and asks for your credit card number, do not give it to them.

Thank you all so much

Luckil DH did not go too far with them - kept questioning how they got the numner, etc. Fingers crossed no harm done!