Are you on a call with “tech support” from comantra, supportonclick, thenerdsupport, securesecurityinfotech, thesupportonline, go4isecure, thesparksupport, winpctech, compstep, ordinateurassist, advpccare, techisonline, techonsupport, fixonclick, Log4Rescue, PCTechnosupport, onlinepccare, pccare or logmein123.com while reading this?
PLEASE TRY AND RECORD THE CALL, and whether you can or can’t record it, please try and get as much of the following information as you can:
- Do they know your name and address? Ask: “Who was it you wanted to speak to?”
- If so, are you in the phone book under that name and address?
- Are they using a particular name that’s only on your credit card?
- Have you recently contacted your broadband provider or telephone provider?
- And if so, which company was it?
- Is there any other computer based transaction, repair, purchase or enquiry you made online or instore recently, and can you remember where it was?
PLEASE LEAVE A COMMENT! You don’t need to register, but your info would help everyone. There are nearly 900 comments so far – you are not alone!
If you have sensitive information and need to contact me privately, please use this form, but leaving a comment is better as we can build up a picture of what is happening.
Thanks to Deborah for pointing out that http://www.actionfraud.org.uk/ would be a good place to tell about this scam, too.
Tell them you need to go to another phone if you need a moment to set up a mic.
UPDATE: 25th July 2010
More video! Big thanks to Ian Davidson for SIX Youtube Videos. Start with this one below – Ian is a great piss-taker, and winds them up nicely…
And to Andy Brocklehurst for stringing them along for over an hour!
Also to ComputerActive magazine for this 45 minute recording of someone attempting to scam them:
http://www.computeractive.co.uk/computeractive/video/2266990/call-windows-service-centre
UPDATE: 20th July 2010
The Guardian technology editor Charles Arthur [twitter] has written a couple of pieces on this:
http://www.guardian.co.uk/technology/2010/jul/19/police-crackdown-phone-scam-computer
Nineteen websites which were used to perpetrate a phone scam offering “computer support” that defrauded people across the English-speaking world have been closed down by police.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2010/jul/18/phone-scam-india-call-centres
An investigation by the Guardian has established that this scam, which has been going on quietly since 2008 but has abruptly grown in scale this year, is being run from call centres based in Kolkata, by teams believed to have access to sales databases from computer and software companies
Charles is also actively blogging about the scams.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/technology/blog/2010/jul/20/phone-calls-india-scams
and later
http://www.guardian.co.uk/technology/blog/2010/jul/23/phone-virus-pc-scam-pecon-denies
UPDATED 20th July 2010 - our smart and astute readers have been busy sending in their recordings of the scam (and one even got it on video – see below):
20th July 2010: Scott put his iPhone Phonejacker app to good use to bring us this bit of pure genius. It gets a bit quiet in the middle, but if you can’t wait, skip to 3m 50 seconds and feel the wrath!
Audio clip: Adobe Flash Player (version 9 or above) is required to play this audio clip. Download the latest version here. You also need to have JavaScript enabled in your browser.
16th July 2010: Here’s Chris from wyredmedia.com and has written a blog entry about the Fixonclick scam, and he comprehensively strung them along for a good 20 minutes. Good work, Chris!
Audio clip: Adobe Flash Player (version 9 or above) is required to play this audio clip. Download the latest version here. You also need to have JavaScript enabled in your browser.
22nd June 2010 – a triple treat for you!
Here’s The Watchmaker with what happens if you piss them off (warning: sweary!)
Audio clip: Adobe Flash Player (version 9 or above) is required to play this audio clip. Download the latest version here. You also need to have JavaScript enabled in your browser.
Paul B, another great recording:
Audio clip: Adobe Flash Player (version 9 or above) is required to play this audio clip. Download the latest version here. You also need to have JavaScript enabled in your browser.
Graham Saunders with a long, good and comprehensive clip of what you’re in for (worth a listen)
Audio clip: Adobe Flash Player (version 9 or above) is required to play this audio clip. Download the latest version here. You also need to have JavaScript enabled in your browser.
18th Jan 2010 Here’s Sherri with a recording from her answering machine. I think this is a difference outfit, but it sounds scammy:
Audio clip: Adobe Flash Player (version 9 or above) is required to play this audio clip. Download the latest version here. You also need to have JavaScript enabled in your browser.
DO NOT let them take control of your computer, but please try and get as much info as you can.
HUGE thanks and respec to youtube user striderzer0 for his great work in recording the call. See the four youtube videos below.
http://www.youtube.com/view_play_list?p=ACD9A8922BBBFE4CUPDATE: 13/01/2009 – Donal Macintyre covered this on ITV’s This Morning show. Watch it here.
Update: 04/12/2009 Made it into the news! Thanks to Malc for this one: http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/europe/isle_of_man/8392303.stm and via Google News Alerts: http://www.buteman.co.uk/news/Rothesay-businessman-warns-of-computer.5883193.jp
Update: 26/11/2009
Since I first reported on this on Jan 18th 2009, this one page has had over 24,000 views and 261 comments, and recently there’s been a huge surge in the amount of calls received. I’m getting two or 3 people leaving comments every day now, and over the last week, the page views have surged to close to 400 PER DAY and easily accounts for the most viewed page on my blog by far.
Which suggests that Comantra or Supportonclick or Logmein123 or whoever they are calling themselves this week, are increasing their activity.
YOU CAN HELP!
Please, contact the media and/or help spread the word. It’ll only take 5 minutes.
If you are in the UK:
Tell a consumer programme about it:
http://www.bbc.co.uk/watchdog/gotastory/
http://www.bbc.co.uk/radio4/youandyours/liz_barclay_consumer_series.shtml
or perhaps your local or national paper. Oddly, in the April the BBC said there “wasn’t any interest” in this story. Take a moment to prove there is!
Also, report it to: https://secure.consumerdirect.gov.uk/reportascam.aspx
There are also threads on http://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/showthread.html?t=1613667 and
http://www.hotukdeals.com/item/502631/call-from-microsoft-maintenance-dep
The Register have an article about it:
http://www.theregister.co.uk/2009/04/10/supportonclick_scareware_scam/
Note: The Staffordshire Police have also issued a warning about this:
http://www.staffordshire.gov.uk/NR/rdonlyres/3ECA6489-52AC-4A64-A48E-4E44743CB9CB/90090/TelephoneComputerSupportWarning.pdf
In the US:
http://www.dslreports.com/forum/r22222049-Scam-Supportonclickcom-scareware-scam
In Australia:
http://forums.whirlpool.net.au/forum-replies-archive.cfm/1057308.html
Got an email on 31st July 2010 from Colin M. linking to the following forum post and saying:
http://forums.whirlpool.net.au/forum-replies.cfm?t=1485775
I have contacted most of the Australian SCAM agencies and I have included an extract by Microsoft Australia. The 2nd last posting in this Forum item. The irony of my situation I have 3 phone lines and all included in the “do not call register” and the 3rd line is not even listed in the directories and is 10,000 numbers away from the other 2 phone numbers. It is not even given out.
I’m Colinm39 on this as well as your Forum.
I have just had my 4th phone call, this time a female but from “pconlinesupport” with the preamble that they have a report that my computer was corrupted etc..
As soon as I told them I was an IT Professional and in Security and chasing them they hung up immediately.
Worldwide
Anywhere in the world:
You can help people find news about the scam by stumbling or digging:
http://www.stumbleupon.com/url/www.digitaltoast.co.uk/fake-tech-support-call-scam-prefetch-virus-logmein123com
http://digg.com/security/Fake_tech_support_call_scam_prefetch_virus_logmein123_com
Or log the info at http://whocallsme.com/Phone-Number.aspx/01274900834
Even if you just post a link to my site on your blog, or in your favourite forum, it will help ensure that people looking for help, find it.
Other blogs referencing this:
http://hphosts.blogspot.com/2009/12/techonsupportcom-click4rescuecom.html – has some more info, as well as other ways of reporting the scam.
http://ctaspley.wordpress.com/2009/04/06/update-on-support-on-click-police-alert-to-scam/
From the comments below, it appears that logmein123.com is not the scam itself, but is being used by the scammers. Thanks to Michael in the comments section below for that info. If you have found this post useful, please use the “share this” link below if you have a social networking account such as digg, delicious, facebook, stumbleupon etc. It will help others to find this.
And McCaffee Siteadvisor has many aggrieved reviewers of the Support OnClick scammers too!
So, possibly post there too – anything to warn people.
See also threads here and here on MoneySavingExpert and a post on the JamiesRants blog
I got a call on the 16th of January with an “out of area” (ie: overseas, not “uk withheld”) caller ID.
He had a thick strong accent and started off by saying:
“Hello Mr Marshall, this is the Windows XP service provider – we have had a report from your computer that it is infected”. Well, that’s not my name, but one I use on forms where I think spam might result.
At this point, I started recording the call – the only problem is that the recording is illegible! I’m trying to clean it up so will post as soon as I do – check back later!
HELP! Does anyone know how to “clean up” bad recordings? Here’s a snippet of what I recorded – I still have the “original” file in audacity, and have tried changing sample rates. Is this recording lost forever?
Audio clip: Adobe Flash Player (version 9 or above) is required to play this audio clip. Download the latest version here. You also need to have JavaScript enabled in your browser.
I was also noting it down, and here’s what he told me to do:
Go to the start>run menu and type in
“p as in peter, r as in romeo, e as in echo, f as in foxtrot” – etc etc, to cut a long story short, he wanted me to type in
“prefetch virus” in the run prompt. As it happens, I know exactly what that would do – it simply opens the windows prefetch folder. The word “virus” is ignored
(For a bit more info on what this normal windows folder is, click here. As a rule, however, unless you know exactly what the result is going to be do not start following instructions random strangers tell you to do!)
“OK sir, can you please tell me how many files there are?”
I told him 30.
“Oh my gosh, this is a sign of very heavy infection. You must not touch these files. [about the only truthful part of the call]. Please now clear this box and type ‘temp’ and press enter”.
Again, “your computer has very heavy infection with so many files”. He then babbled some crap about how these file were your f-a-t32 system files and that “at any time these files could scratch your hard drive”. Riiiighhhht…..
Then came the money shot. “We will connect you now with an agent, please go to www.logmein123.com”
As I had full armoury on (google toolbar, avg, running Chrome etc), so I decided to check it out. It redirected to https://secure.logmeinrescue.com/Customer/Code.aspx
After some chitchat in which he confirmed my (incorrect, spamtrap) home address, he then said “I will now connect you to an agent – for this there is just a small one-time charge of £12″.
Before I let him take my details, I said I wanted to check what company it was. Again, he said it was “your Windows XP service provider” (whatever the hell that means).
To the answer “where are you based and what is your name”, bear in mind this man had a VERY thick/strong Indian accent and was calling from a scratchy overseas number.
“My name is Kevin Watts and we are based in Bradford”. Gold-dust! You couldn’t make it up! (Well, he obviously had).
I asked him to hold while I got my card. I put it on speakerphone and went down to make a cup of tea. I brewed up a nice cup of Yorkshire Tea, found a biscuit, did a bit of washing up, and went back upstairs. FIVE MINUTES later he was still going “Mr Marshall? Can you hear me?”. Nothing if not persistant! I then just decided to have a bit of fun and pretended he’d been put through to the UK police! Immediately, a supervisor (another strong Indian accent) came on the line sounding very surprised, and claimed that “Mr Marshall contacted us”!
So there you go – be warned. If I can get the audio up, I will. Please post a comment below if you’ve had this call.
PS – it didn’t sound much different to this!
Just had the exact same call,Luckily i Googled what he asked me to type in the run box and was brought here.
I strung him along for about 30 mins pretending to be unable to carry out his commands =]
Then i left the phone on the table and popped out for some breakfast..!
I have had several of these calls and for once my lack of knowledge has assisted me with computers! Because I dont really know what they are asking as most of the time their accent is too thick I just ignore them and hang up.
Windows registry is the heart of each computer. The longer use of computers, the more software installed, registry garbage inside the computer registry will be more. Most of the software will add unnecessary junk to the registry which makes the computer crash or slower and slower. If you have the following problem, and answered yes, then you need to clear your PC using the registry cleaner software.Registry software could make you modify registry very easy, if you don’t know which one to use, please reference the following introduction.
http://www.bestexternalhdd.com/repair/top-10-best-registry-repair-software-reviews.html
Got one of these this morning. I told the woman at the end of the line that she wasn’t fooling anyone and that I knew it was a scam. Even told her what she was going to tell me to do.
I said to her that if she knew my computer was on (which she’d claimed) the she’d be able to tell me my IP address. She got cross and got me to speak to some guy called ‘Jason’.
Hi Paul,
Thanks for the reply, and advice. I’ve had several more chats with my dad and had a look at his pc (the first thing I did was disconnect it from the router and the internet). Without going into details, I’m now sure the login was successful and I was concerned enough about what I discovered to contact the police for some advice. They sent someone round (within an hour) to take various details and have kept me updated.
File sharing wasn’t enabled with the laptop, and the antivirus and windows updates on it are all up to date so I think it’s okay – thanks for that information; I’ll check out those links just to be sure, though.
The pc itself is ancient and well overdue to be binned, so I think that’s the end of its days, anyway.
Re. your final comment on the antivirus (transpired it was actually his firewall that had tried to stop him) I did say something along those lines; and discovered he’d been clicking ‘allow’ on a regular basis; whenever it had popped up, in fact. I guess there’s a lesson to be learnt there; there’s little point in installing security programmes if the user doesn’t really understand what they’re there for.
Cheers again.
Suggestion
“Good day.
I understand the purpose of your call and I’m obliged to inform you that for purposes of my own security your call is being recorded in highest qualityso that if necessary it is admissable in a Court of Law, either by myself or by the Authorities in this country or in your home country. Please continue”
I wonder how long they’d stay on the phone.
These people called me from a phone number that was not available from my phone ID system and talked at great length telling me my lesser computer drives where loaded with viruses. All this seemed strange to me because I had just had my computer serviced. I allowed them to get onto my computer to let me see what they were talking about. I’m not very computer savvy, but am no fool on it, either. It was fairly late at night and I wasn’t thinking straight, but I watched what they were doing. They were just plaing around and deleting my files and getting into my personal information. I never talk to telemarketers. They had already done some fooling around on my computer deleting my personal files and then demanded I take out one of their plans. If they work on your computer they demand money before the contract is signed. Like a fool I did it, now I am out $109 and have alerted my bank that they are scammers. I tried to get ahold of my credit card company, but hope the bank can do something. BEWARE!! These people are slick. Dont have anything to do with them!!
What is the name of the company that appears on your credit card receipt?
I received a similar call aound half an hour ago, purportedly from Microsoft telling me my computer has been infected and is being used for spam attacks. Again a very thick Indian accent on a terrible line. I just told him I was unable to understand him as the line was so bad and he then said he would call back later.
As I have Caller Line Identification have no intention of picking it up next time!
Tony Evans
Just got the call now. Was following along until she asked I go to a website. I decided to type it into Google instead of typing it into my address bar and told her I might have an errand to run in a few minutes. That was smart of me, I suppose. I then went to the site and before putting any information in, I told her that I was being rushed by other people to go accomplish said errand and to call back later. Well, I guess I should go find an errand to do…
Had a call now this was the first time I answered, my mother said she was busy the first four times. I followed along he asked about how many PC’s I had and which browser I used, he asked me to open IE which I have uninstalled so I opened in Firefox.
Then he asked me to search for a website – http://www.helppconline.com
I then went to the site and also opened a new tab and searched for the company name. Upon a quick search and finding a Yahoo answer reading don’t trust. I searched again and found this website. He asked me to click on remote assistance I pretented to and strung him on until he asked me what was on the screen. I asked him what this was for, he couldn’t really explain but something about a computer scan provided by “service provider” and “Microsoft”. I promptly told him I didn’t need a scan, he then told me “wait it’s almost done”. I answered do not phone me again and hung up, the number was withheld. I then stumbled this link to all my email contacts.
My wife was taken by a cold caller named Ricky Mathews Claiming to be from Microsoft Technical support helpdesk. Then he had her run event viewer and check the logs. I showed her the utube video from this blog and she stated that the caller sounded exactly the same as the guy on the call in the video. It was like a Script was being read to work you up to pay the fee. the charges on our AMEX came from THEASPIRETE Paypal account 4029357733. The Have a DBA of Mark Paypal. Merchant Address is shown as: 2145 Hamilton Ave, San Jose, CA, 95125-5905 USA with Busines Phone number 402-935-7733. Phone number given during the call is an unlisted # in Brooklyn, NY 718-715-4202. I have already owned Norton 360 software and other security software. I cannot tell if any other software was downloaded from this call. I am working to process an inquirey into the payment through AMEX to reverse the charges for this being a SCAM. Thank you for bloging this info so that we can help others avoid what we went through.
Thanks,
Larry
Called today around 13.15. Gave partners name and initials, did not know sex of person they wanted to speak to. – I have a different surname to my partner and told them there was no such person as Mr. XXXX. I let them go through a large part of technical geek stuff without letting on that I was probably more computer literate than he was. We recently changed phone and isp to phonecoop.coop.uk. (The phone coop.) What will be really interesting is if we get a call for my name with this scam as I run Linux and haven’t used Doze on my machine for over 10 years. I was tempted to get the instructions for for ridding the computer of this, “Spyware and malware.” but got bored.
Dave Jackon.
Oh no I let them into my computer on Sat 14th August. Call quoted an address I had from Sept 06 and July 07 where I was when I purchased the lap top and returned reg. docs. Indian man from computer maintenance department checked I was registered user and insisted my software warranty had run out and was a basic requirement of the system, and that my computer could turn into useless box with blue screen unless I renewed. He said I was a very special customer (that’s what BT says when they want to sell you more services). I said I was in TPS, he said they allowed him. He told me to open control “prefetch” and got v. excited at “warnings” and “errors”. I don’t know anything about the workings of my lap top and although anxious typed in logmein123 so that the “Microsoft Certified Technician” Evan 268126 would sort it out. First guy said his name was Jeff and even spelt it for me. ” Evan” then removed everything in the prefetch window. somewhere on the screen I saw tech sup@atribune.org. Jeff then tried very hard to sell me PC Techmaster Microsoft Soft Ware Support (he said) including malware, spyware, PC speedup, Email prob support, Boot errors, Data backup and restore, Online Banking Security, Printer and Scanner Support. For this he wanted; Professional Plan 3 Yrs at £60 pa or Advanced Plan 4 years at £56 pa or Premium Plan 5 yrs at £55 pa. Up popped a payment screen that said Pinnacle E Solutions Pvt. Ltd. I refused and he put me onto his “supervisor” Samantha who tried again to tell me my computer would become useless if I didn’t pay. I turned off the lap top and put the phone down. I wrote down more or less everything they said – hence above. BT didn’t have callers number.
How b stupid was I? I was left shaking and feeling violated and stupid. What I want to know now is are my paypal payments secure – I’ve ordered a couple of things over the internet since. I don’t do internet banking. I don’t think there is anything else that matters on it except a couple of sites store my credit card number I think. Would really appreciate a reply to these questions.
Neil; it’s important to distinguish between logmein, and the people using it.
If you read and listen to the calls and transcripts again, you will see that you don’t have to be a “conspiracy theorist” so quite clearly see what scam is at work here.
Again, please listen to some of the calls and videos that have been uploaded.
Hi I had a man with a very thick indian accent call me two and a quarter hours ago, said he worked for the company iglobalsonline which was working for Microsoft and that in the last 4 weeks they had had over 2000 reports from my computer saying I’d got a virus. I said that I had the latest addition of norton anti virus and that hadn’t showed up anything. He toldme the virus was clever and switches norton off even though it appears to be on. Like an idiot I believed him!!!! typed in logmein123.com in google then allowed them to take over my computer. They showed me a list of warnings and activity etc and said they could fix it. I said it was alright i pay pcworld £7.99 a month to take care of my laptop and was not prepared to pay anyone else to do it! He said ok and hung up.
Now I realise that this was a scam and concerned that I let them access my computer!!!! They have just rung me back 2 hours later!!!! and asked if I have any problems with my computer!!! I said no! and he said ok and hung up! Do you think they will have done anything to my laptop or got hold of any info? the only screen I saw them on was this false log of warnings.
My wife had a call from Ryan (with heavy Indian accent) from Support for PC’s with normal guff about viruses, Microsoft, etc, Wife took telephone number to call back 02032864827. I called it and asked where they were – somewhere in Oxfordshire with a postcode OX2 7SG which is strange because I thought 0203 was one of the new Central London numbers.
Shropshire, UK. Just had a call from ‘Mary’ with a chinese accent, from ‘online pccare’. Knew my name, address & postcode. I found this website while she was chuntering about problems on my pc, but was unable to record the conversation. I asked for her telephone number, and she hung up. Amazingly 1471 produced a phone number: 019476632176. When I called this with my camera all set up to record the conversation, ‘invalid number’ came up.
Just had a call from a woman claiming to be from ‘Windows Operting System’ telling me she was calling because there have been lots of PCs infected with viruses on my street…continually asked me whether I use a computer and got very annoyed when I wouldn’t answer..kept prompting me to just go and open my computer. I was highly suspicious so put the phone down then vame and researched online. Watch out!
Just spent half an hour having a very obviously Indian operator and set of ‘supervisors’ talk me through giving them remote access and then a window providing my credit card details. I terminated the call when the supervisor told me she was calling from Queensland Australia and when I asked which town she told me ‘Wikipedia”…
Just had a call, indian sounding voice, they knew my name and telephone number, saying there were virus problems emanating from my computer. After asking questions about whether I understood computers and asking me to delete some system update files, which you cannot do as they are write protected, asked me to go to logmein123.com and when I asked who’s site it was, was told “it was created by mahatma gandi” then he rang off.
Had the call yesterday. The only company that has both my name and number, and has a call centre in the Indian sub-continent is Dell. Sounds like their customer list is doing the rounds.
It sounds like you might have terminated that call too late. It seems to me they are polite until they get what they want.
You have probably already resolved this now, but I would cancel the card you used.
Had exactly this happen to me today. I wondered why Microsoft would call people up, but continued until he got to the “prefetch unwanted” part of his statement. Then I thought his opening lines were incorrect and didn’t make sense. He said it was a windows problem and had got my details from when my copy of Windows was registered. The only problem is I registered Windows under my name, yet he asked for my partner when I had picked up the phone. We are not married so have different surnames. Obviously he has taken her name from the phone book. After asking him to tell me my name he said it’s not a scam, but if I don’t believe him just terminate the call. So I did.
Had a phone call today 19:30 26-08-2010 who claimed he was from online pc hub and that he would redict me to a certified microsoft tech site logmein123.com while he was talking to me i was being a bit thick with him and it sounded like he was getting stroppyfunny anough his name was Mark sound good doesnt it any i just let him go on and on and on in the end he hung up dont know why i though he was helping me out ?????????
I was very skeptical with this call and only did the “windows button and R”, as directed, then I started to type in eventvr, or whatever, then stopped after it asked me to continue. His name, supposedly, was Robert, and his contact number is 1-888-408-4117. No company just calls you to fix your computer for free. Lol!
We just got a call like this from an indian tech for logmein123. He talked to my mom first and she asked me to talk to him but i refused. He strung her along thinking i wasnt there (I was in the background). I listened in as he guided her to the eventviewer then described all the errors there as hacking occurrences on the computer. From this point i knew as a college IT student it was all a scam but i let it go to see what happened. He directed us to logmein123.com where it had a connection thingy to connect to a tech if you use a 6 digit code. He gave us the code but then strangely hung up a short bit after. This is because I googled searched this topic and he must have known I was there investigating(or he thought we entered it like chumps and he thought he won, therefore terminating the call since his job was done). We didnt enter the code and I have NoScript enabled on this comp so nothing happened, just in case the main page was laced with anything.
-Rob R
We’ve had 5 phonecalls over the last two days regarding a similar thing. A gentleman with an Indian accent phones up saying he’s from BT but the call was to do with some problem with Microsoft??? Since when have BT and Microsft spoken to each other? (we’ve just moved over to BT broadband) – then asks us to type tinyurl.com etc into a particular box. This, I may say, we have not done as his call was completely unsolicited. He’s very convincing and persistant. The first time he phoned my husband told him there had been a power cut so he said he’d phone back. I will be reporting this to BT and if they aren’t interested – which they will be by the time I’ve finished – I will contact the police.
Hope this of help – just away to phone BT. Wish me luck.
SLB
System recure a fraud company , its located in India, they act as their location based in US, they have changed their domain in srcurenow.com, guys be aware of this company ever, they are cheater
Got a call from WinPCTech today. Guy with an Indian accent asking me to run a CMD – eventvwr.msc. They said they wanted me to run this so they could show me something that has happened to my computer – “Your computer has many virus’s”. Hung Up – what a scam!
I just ask what country are you ringing from and the phone gets slammed down!
Hilkin UK
interesting, a lot of you have a lot to say
We get one of these calls EVERY day. They usually ask for my mother, and starting blathering on about how they’re monitoring our pc. Whenever you challenge them they either start being patronising or put the phone down. How do you stop them calling?
we have been getting phone calls weekly off these people. they told mr they were from microsft and rhat there was a proplem with my software and to turn my computer on. told them they could be anyone and not to ring again, but hey kept ringing with different excuse dont know where they got my name or number, in the end my husband told them to politley go away they have’nt rang since
Dear Sir,
I got a call from someone named FRANK and said that i have got some problem with my computer and my computer has send some warnings and error reports to their server. They told me that they are calling from MY PC TREAT on behalf of MICROSOFT. After i rejected their offer i called in at Microsoft and asked them about this errors and warnings and they told me that it was a scam call from someone. These people and after money. Moreover they use paypal for the payments. I strictly ask you to help me stop this company to prevent the scam. How can paypal approve these merchant requests even. They are after people’s hard earned money. PLEASE HELP US.
Regards
George Bebbington
Just had a call from a very persistant asian man who claimed to be from Microsoft support. He said my computer was is danger of crashing and they had received several error messages from it over the last few days but not to worry they could help me sort the problems.
They wouldn’t tell me where they got my number and just kept saying all Microsoft owners info is on file.
I am not very computer savvy and was very dubious but he assured me everything was fine and I could speak to his supervisor who tried to convince me I needed help immediately.
I told them I needed to get advice so they gave me an address I could check but avoided giving a phone number.
They said they would phone back so if they do I’ll try and get more info.
Address is Microsoft Manchester, Manchester Business Park,Aveda Way,M22 5DG
Hope this helps.
Hope this helps
Just had a call from a very pushy Asian man claiming to be called Abhi Williams from Microsoft support asking me to use logmein.com, he was extremely concerned about my laptop about to crash – I asked for a phone number to phone him back on and was given 0800 014 8939 – based on advice from this site i asked who they were wanting to speak to but they were unable to give me a name…I was very dubious especially given my laptop is owned by my employer and was given to me last week!! Hope these guys get what they deserve….
I had a practically identical phone call yesterday from someone with an Indian accent saying he was calling from UK Global Maintenance (a different name). After I had put in the code word he then asked me to type Spyeware into the box on the bottom left, at which point I decided to call a halt and shut down my computer. I said I wished to call him back and pressed him for a phone number. He gave me the number 7605820302 which surprise, surprise is an unavailable number. He said his name was Ron Williams and that he was calling from the UK! When I asked where he got my phone number from he said it was because I had given it when buying something over the internet.
These have been coming in waves every few months for the last couple of years. The latest wave started again yesterday, this time using the name Computer Maintenance Services. They always ask for “Mr …” using my wife’s maiden name as that’s the on on the phone bill & in the phone book. When I told the third caller yesterday I was getting sick of the calls and knew it was a scam he clearly put me on repeat dial and I then received about 10-15 calls in a row with a hang up each time. Already had another call this morning. It usually tails off after a a couple of weeks, presumably as they move to a new list. If anyone has any ideas for blocking or stopping the actual calls I’d like to hear them.
In August we had a scam phone call and told us we had computer problem and today also, they said they are from PC support .. and I don’t use PC . So please be careful – as the ID number on the phone, only International.
I was at my mothers house and as she is nearly 80 and has never owned a computer I took the call and made out I believed everything they told me. I agreed that my computer was running slow and when asked to turn it on I told him I was sitting at it and it was already on. I then pretended to follow his instruction……acting a bit vague. Eventually he asked me what I could see on the screen and I told him that there was a message to say that the idiot on the other end of the phone must be more stupid than he thinks I am if he thinks I’m taken in by his scam. I then “read” out a few more abusive comments and informed him that I didn’t even have a computer in the house. As soon as he “twigged” he was being made a fool of he told me to **** OFF! and hung up. He called back a minute later and just said “**** OFF” and then when he called a third time I got in first and told him the police were tracing his call and would be there soon to arrest him. He told me to “**** OFF” but DIDN’T call again. I’ve now bought a really loud whistle and intend to deafen the next one that calls me!
this happened with me today with a woman,i told her i wasnt interested and said that i need to feed my 3 month old son and she called me a liar and then told me to **** off and then put the phone down and then rung back and asked weher i understood english and told me to **** off again..!! i thought it was funny at first and thought it was a wind up ..
Have just been contacted for this scam, I kept him talking for about half an hour and so must have run up his bill somewhat, he was a bit irate when I told him that after pressing run EVENTVWR I could see the words scam, he did not believe me but then realised I was playing him more than he was playing me, here are the details he gave me, I have no problem giving them away as he must have gotten mine somehow. This is what he told me, His name was Maeey, he spelled everything out for me as I asked him too, he worked for http://WWW.onlinepccare.com and his employment number was 11845 he wanted me to run eventvwr and then give me more instructions after that, I did no such thing, he was using my credit card details but using the downstairs phone which is only registered in my credit card I use another private line upstairs, I think that they are going through the phone book though as I got the same call twenty minutes after putting the phone down on this line, he seamed to recognised my voice and hung up again.
I just ran into a phone support scam lind, when I was trying to get help from my photo album.com. Thinkin it was from them, I realized I was on a general support link. They asked me if my computer was slow, and it had been extremely so these last weeks. They offered to clean up with ibe year warranty, but assured with bbb and Micorsoft which they showed me on the computer. I just finished with them fixing up my computer, and happen to check out on google about phone wupports and saw this scam link in which they use logmein123.com which I remeber typing in. I’m afraid I’ve been taken..???
chodnaaaaaaaaaaaa.
Got a call today from a bloke with a strong India accent. Thought he was going to try and sell me life insurance or souble-glazing…but no…he said I was running windows xp on my comp and that it had been inflected by a malicious virus. He said he was from a company that was an official partner of microsoft, directed me to a site called:
http://www.pctophone.com (might have had hyphens in there – don’t remember)
then he walked me though navigation to the tech support page, made special mention of the icons on the left indicating their company partners – microsoft, IBM, Dell, etc. Then he told me to double click on “support” at the bottom. I did that and a pop-up appeared. He then told me to click “run”. That’s when I twigged that it was probably a scam! Quite naive of me up until then but the guy sounded genuine and even had the same first name as me…how many Indian blokes do you know called Alex?! Lol. =))