New phone scam: People claiming they are from Microsoft
Posted: Thu Sep 09, 2010 7:03 pm
My mother got a call today from a person who said he was from Microsoft. He stated Microsoft had been getting error messages from her computer and if she didn't fix the problems, her computer would crash soon. He wanted her to log onto the computer while he was on the phone so he could help fix the problems. He started telling her where to go and what to type in each field. She called me on another line while the "Microsoft" employee was still on the phone and asked a couple questions. When the "Microsoft" employee heard her talking to me, he couldn't get off the phone fast enough.
The wierd thing was, they asked specifically for the wife of the household and knew her name, address and phone number and that they had XP. Obviously the personal information can be obtained easily and I assume they guessed on the Windows XP part. The guy had an indian voice and unfortunately my parents dont have caller id. She sent an email to the local news company and they said they have been getting a lot of emails about it and sent her this link:
http://www.microsoft.com/protect/fraud/ ... sname.aspx
Im just glad she was smart enough to know something was up and to give me a call. Sadly a lot of other people may not. Id love for them to give me or another techy person a call and see how far it goes and to see what all they ask.
So anyone googling for this, its a scam!!! At the very least keep them on the phone and see what they are after and waist the hell out of their time. I am pretty sure they are taking advantage of the new gmail calling feature so they cant be traced.
The wierd thing was, they asked specifically for the wife of the household and knew her name, address and phone number and that they had XP. Obviously the personal information can be obtained easily and I assume they guessed on the Windows XP part. The guy had an indian voice and unfortunately my parents dont have caller id. She sent an email to the local news company and they said they have been getting a lot of emails about it and sent her this link:
http://www.microsoft.com/protect/fraud/ ... sname.aspx
Im just glad she was smart enough to know something was up and to give me a call. Sadly a lot of other people may not. Id love for them to give me or another techy person a call and see how far it goes and to see what all they ask.
So anyone googling for this, its a scam!!! At the very least keep them on the phone and see what they are after and waist the hell out of their time. I am pretty sure they are taking advantage of the new gmail calling feature so they cant be traced.
