Weird phone call! "online pc doctor" - Only thread on these scam calls please

dekop

Just got call from indian bloke who tried to scam me, usual trick pc has virus, press ctrl, fn button ect, any ways played along for a while, about 10 mins, got bored and said pc was talking to me, told him pc said this is bulls++t, poor bloke got so confused, could not believe it , with me chuckling over the phone, he still tried to carry on saying pc was infected, had to hang up then.

ART6

Having no calls from these people for weeks, I have now had a call from them on each of the last four days, including just now. Usual spiel -- "We have detected a problem with your computer."
"Have you really? How have you managed that? I am a computer engineer with International Computers plc (A complete invention, but I was interested to hear how our Indian gentleman would react), and I don't know how you can do that."

He didn't break a stride. "Yes, Sir. We have detected a problem with your computer, and."
"Which one? I am responsible for two hundred, including ten multi-gigabyte servers." I interrupted.
"Yes Sir. It's the one you are using now."
"I'm not using one. I'm wasting my time talking to you on a bloody telephone. Now, if you have question or a suggestion for IC then please submit it."
"Yes Sir, but about your computer..."
"Look, what part of the words F-O don't you understand?"
The Indian gentleman was still talking when I hung up. With a bit of luck he is still repeating his script to a dead line an hour later.

Surely this scam must sooner or later reach saturation point, where there can be no computer user in the world who is not aware of it?

hellboy99

What is the deal with these people, two more calls today from the same number: 00120652157276, where is this coming from?

Irishgoatman

Last time I had a call from these people I told him I didn't have a computer, deathly silence then he hung up!.

Perhaps I should have given my neighbours 'phone number.
He had a text from his wife, back in January, saying "window frozen, what should I do", he replied "pour warm water on it", text came back "now computer's not working at all".:D

daftdave

ART6 wrote: »

Having no calls from these people for weeks, I have now had a call from them on each of the last four days, including just now. Usual spiel -- "We have detected a problem with your computer."
"Have you really? How have you managed that? I am a computer engineer with International Computers plc (A complete invention, but I was interested to hear how our Indian gentleman would react), and I don't know how you can do that."

He didn't break a stride. "Yes, Sir. We have detected a problem with your computer, and."
"Which one? I am responsible for two hundred, including ten multi-gigabyte servers." I interrupted.
"Yes Sir. It's the one you are using now."
"I'm not using one. I'm wasting my time talking to you on a bloody telephone. Now, if you have question or a suggestion for IC then please submit it."
"Yes Sir, but about your computer..."
"Look, what part of the words F-O don't you understand?"
The Indian gentleman was still talking when I hung up. With a bit of luck he is still repeating his script to a dead line an hour later.

Surely this scam must sooner or later reach saturation point, where there can be no computer user in the world who is not aware of it?

its a bit like fishing , there will always be fish in the sea.

_AVALANCHE_

daftdave wrote: »

its a bit like fishing , there will always be fish in the sea.

...that's debateable actually.:p

clint_silver

the missus goes mad but I have to say I absolutely love it when they ring.

I work in IT and work from home sometimes, when I get the call, on with the speaker and its have the craic time. I get 40-50 minutes each time.

I run VMware players and I set up a VM snap a few weeks ago just so they could install the software over remote access software and I wanted to see them doing it. They called last week, and after 20 minutes we got to the point where they were to log in but for some reason the remote access software wouldnt install , the guy was going mad so I started suggesting things like reverse ssh putty tunnels to get through, I offered to install it at which time I think he realised he was out of his depth and he hung up.

I'll get them again.

I even once told them I didnt need the remote access software and said I just wanted to pay so he passed me to their accounts team, I gave all my credit card details with a few different numbers. I left him smelling the money, but the payment just wouldnt go through for him. couldnt stop laughin for days.

theyre the craic!!!

are you serious

any calls from 017061200 are a scam

GhostInTheRuins

Had a call from another one of these scammers this morning. I kept him on the line for 40 minutes or so. Needless to say he was well pissed off when i got bored of him and told him I knew he was a scamming bastard. He called me names

clint_silver

GhostInTheRuins wrote: »

Had a call from another one of these scammers this morning. I kept him on the line for 40 minutes or so. Needless to say he was well pissed off when i got bored of him and told him I knew he was a scamming bastard. He called me names

after a few minutes building up a relationship with them on the phone, say
Can I ask you a question, I feel like we're friends, we are friends arent we?
Yes.
ok, every time you ring me I keep you on the phone for 40-50 minutes and then I laugh at you in various manners and you hang up. If you answer a couple of questions now, if you ring again, I wont laugh at you anymore and I'll cut the conversation short straight away, is that fair enough, otherwise I'll keep dragging out the calls? then ask him does he make much money at it, and how could you start your own scam, ask him can you practice on him and see how it goes....

eh, hello Apu, my names clint, I work for windows care Ireland, I see you have a virus, can you click on something there for me......
then start goin "oh my god, youre infected, youre infected, jebus help us all...."

Im gonna do it and record it. they rang this mornig but I wasnt there, wifey told them to ring back this evening.

Going Forward

Got my call from the "Service Senter" about my "Vindows", yes they are indeed dirty after the recent rains.

From 00000 this time, a bit weird?

Anyway, put him on speakerphone in front of 15 family members for a laugh.

Offering him my credit card number up front, to save time like, everyone laughing, he hangs up. Awwwww.:p

Shenshen

They used to ring us a while back, two or three times in total.
The thing that made me laugh is neither my husband nor myself are using Windows, he's got Macs and my laptop runs Ubuntu.
When I told him that, the guy actually pretended Ubuntu was just one version of Windows, and the problem was with all Windows versions...


On a serious note, how some people can fall for that is beyond me.

Tusky

as detailed here my mother got scammed with this today. Luckily she didn't give them any credit card details but did install some software (advanced system care or something) and allowed remote access.

Just got a call from a panicked mother saying she had been harassed with calls from people claiming to be from 'windows customer care'. They told her she had viruses on her computer that needed removing and wanted her to install software.

She eventually gave in and installed what appeared to be some antivirus software - I think they may have been controlling her pc remotely at this point, not sure. They wanted her to give credit card details to pay for some other service but she refused. Bastards.

Over the phone, I talked her through changing all her passwords and removing the software. I also told her to cancel her cards as a precaution.

Is there anything else she needs to do? Is this a common scam? Can't believe she fell for it but I suppose it's not so obvious to the non-techy among us.

I have had her change windows/gmail/facebook passwords, uninstalled the software and turn remote access off. She also cancelled cards as a precaution.

I'm going to get her to install malwarebytes and then change passwords again. Is there anything else she needs to do?

[edit] my mother doesn't know how many programs she installed (feck sake) - is there an easy way for me to check this? Keeping in mind that I am talking her through it over the phone.

yoyo

Tusky wrote: »

as detailed here my mother got scammed with this today. Luckily she didn't give them any credit card details but did install some software (advanced system care or something) and allowed remote access.



I have had her change windows/gmail/facebook passwords, uninstalled the software and turn remote access off. She also cancelled cards as a precaution.

I'm going to get her to install malwarebytes and then change passwords again. Is there anything else she needs to do?

[edit] my mother doesn't know how many programs she installed (feck sake) - is there an easy way for me to check this? Keeping in mind that I am talking her through it over the phone.

Get here to download Team Viewer and use that to remote into the machine

Nick

VinLieger

My honest to god favorite answer to these guys is saying i use a mac, they just dont know what to do.
Ive also tried the computer science degree approach and saying you are a IT manager for a major company, then theres the linux one and you throw a whole load of techno babble at them, telling them you wrote your own OS is also a fun one to try.
One time i got really snotty with them after their 3rd call in one day and told him to go **** himself etc, he called back three times asking what my problem was and why i was so abusive to him after all he was just doing his job...... which i replied "yes your job to scam me out of every penny you can"

robinph

They have had the nerve to accuse me of lying when I've claimed to be using a Mac or Linux.

kleefarr

Just got one of these vankers. First was a woman, who couldn't understand what I was on about, or I her. So she said she would pass me over to her manager. I hung up.
Then the 'Manager' from Microsoft phoned. Told me that I have a bad computer and that I need to fix it or get a new one. He said my computer was slow. I told him it wasn't. He insisted it was and started getting stroppy. I told him that I build computers and it wasn't slow, but he still insisted and I didn't know what I was on about. I told him to fark off and hung up. Vankers!

clint_silver

kleefarr wrote: »

Just got one of these vankers. First was a woman, who couldn't understand what I was on about, or I her. So she said she would pass me over to her manager. I hung up.
Then the 'Manager' from Microsoft phoned. Told me that I have a bad computer and that I need to fix it or get a new one. He said my computer was slow. I told him it wasn't. He insisted it was and started getting stroppy. I told him that I build computers and it wasn't slow, but he still insisted and I didn't know what I was on about. I told him to fark off and hung up. Vankers!

ok if you dont time and are busy then just hang up but its the most fun you can have on the phone. you can pretend to be or doing anything and they just keep on going.

I had one on last week after the initial blurb... and me feigning shock horror at all the virusseses that I supposedly had I got him to spell eventvwr, only with his accent I couldnt make out the v.

him: go to eventvwr thats e...v
me: ok, e..b
him: no, e..v..
me: yes, I heard you, e..b.
him: no sir, please listen carefully....E....V...
me: ah yes, V as in vagina... so thats V..B...
him: NOOO, sir please......E...
me: ok, ok, ok, I got it.... E.V.B (Ive tears flooding up with laughter...)
him: (he finally lost it) sir, have you a mirror in the house...
me: a what? HAHAHA can you spell that please... thank you call again.

theyre the craic!!!!

TAPlank

We have started getting these calls again. I will tell the next one who calls me that I would be delighted with help in fixing my computer as one of the little yellow balls has got in among the red ones and I cannot find a way of fixing this. I will admit that it is a cheap copy of a well known Japanese model but it worked fine until this happened and I dont want to fix it by painting.

Either that or say as Madge in the TV series Benidorm famously said, "I spy with my little eye, something beginning with AB" Absolute Bo....cks!

GhostInTheRuins

We're getting more and more of these ****ing bastards calling the house. What I'd like to know is where they get your name and number and address. When they call here they have more information than you could get in the phone book or any place like that.

They don't know we don't have a windows pc though :rolleyes:

Liam90

are you serious wrote: »

any calls from 017061200 are a scam

got a missed call from this number today.:eek:

mach1982

Just start speaking Irish, random words like the Carlsberg ad. They've never called back.

conorhickey

It happen my family and my dad called microsoft and they said they never make cold calls so its definitely a scam

clint_silver

Put them on speaker phone, stick record on the old iphone or whatever with voice recorder and upload to soundcloud.

see who can come up with the most inventive piss take.

Irishgoatman

conorhickey wrote: »

It happen my family and my dad called microsoft and they said they never make cold calls so its definitely a scam

Yes, it's been known to be a scam for quite a few years.
But if just one person a week fell for it, the data they could collect would be very valuable.

conorhickey

Irishgoatman wrote: »

Yes, it's been known to be a scam for quite a few years.
But if just one person a week fell for it, the data they could collect would be very valuable.

yeh my dad would have fallen for it only i was there and told him it was a scam, they were asking for us to download a remote control app so he could do what he wanted on the computer (Steal info,install viruses and charge to remove etc.)

bernardamaac.

Cant someone with a few buds just send a trojan or do a ddos attack or something?

yoyo

bernardamaac. wrote: »

Cant someone with a few buds just send a trojan or do a ddos attack or something?

No asking about/encouraging illegal activity please.

daniela.v

Happened to me also today one Indian guy called me claiming that is from Microsoft and told me that the hackers are trying to enter in my PC system.How stupid he thought I am....But actually I am lucky that my husband is an IT industry and when i told him that he closed the phone right away.I hope never call again trying to scam people.

Irishgoatman

Had what was obviously going to be one of these calls this morning.
Haven't had one for months now so thought I'd have some fun.

Unfortunately the woman had just started to talk when we some how got cut off. I waited a while for her to ring back but no such luck.

What a very disappointing start to the day:(