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The Unstoppable 'Tech Support' Scam
Barence writes "A pernicious new type of scam is targeting British computer owners, reports PC Pro. The con is both fiendishly clever and ridiculously simple. The fraudster cold-calls the customer and tells them that Microsoft has detected a virus on their PC, then invites them to download a piece of remote-assistance software. No doubt reassured by the lines of indecipherable code flitting across their screen, the caller assures the customer they can make the virus vanish – but first, of course, they want payment. £185 to be precise. The spoof site behind the scam is approved by McAfee's Site Advisor and bears Microsoft logos, something which both companies have failed to act upon. Meanwhile, an assortment of British regulators have said there is nothing they can do to stop it."
The only thing you need to stop this unstoppable scam is for people to be unwilling to shell out a significant sum of money to some c**t who calls them up out of the blue.
I mean, £185, when you didn't know there was anything wrong with your computer in the first place? You'd need to have more money than brains to shell out for that.
It's like the one where some dubious company persuades you to install some new version of their operating system claiming that it's super fast and totally secure, etc. etc. and then after six months your machine crawls to a halt unless you give them more money for the next version which is faster, more secure, etc. etc.
Oh wait...
Once I was a four stone apology. Now I am two separate gorillas.
Yeah. What morally responsible individual would ruin the good name of Microsoft?
God, there are some real scumbags in the world.
And a lot of fools.
You would be surprised how many there are. I work as a network admin and I have dealt with some .... interesting?.... people. One emailed me to tell me their email wasn't working. Yes I know we have all read it in a comic but it's true. I had one of the CFO's I did some work for fill in and almost send a scam bank email form. He at the last second called me to see if I thought it was legit. sigh. I have had people call me up in a panic cause the system was "doing something illegal and they didn't want to get in trouble" (illegal exception errors). I could go on and on. This doesn't surprise me at all. A lot of people when it comes to anything to do with a computer are struck dumb immeditatly and stop using whatever intelligence they have.
letting an idiot know they are an idiot is not a game... it's a responsibility. - by Kristopeit, M. D. (1892582)
Sounds exactly like a telephone scam now happening here in Chile.
:-)
They call old people telling them that their grandson is involved in some sort of a car accident, and need money for bail or pay the affected part for the damages, anyway they tell them that if they don't get the money his/her beloved grandson will be in jail for a long time
Then, they ask for the address to send a messenger to pick up the payment, in terms of cash, LCD TV, Blu-ray, etc.
And people fell for it... even the ones without a grandson
the problem with morally acceptable of making money is that they often morally tie you to the person paying you in some way. And therefor to keep morally on the up and up, you continue to have to make morally right decisions and actions. Scams, however, it's just a matter of how far you can string a person before you move on to the next one. And you seldom have to worry about silly things like reporting taxes and employing people, though some scams do get that large that they employee people who unwittingly (sure, right) participate. Still easier than providing a useful service that works to make customers happy.
God, there are some real scumbags in the world.
Yes, but they are non-violent and require the cooperation of their "victims". Thus, they are like ticks, leeches, mosquitoes, flies, and worms: they are unpleasant and downright nasty but they serve a purpose. They provide a limiting function. They disincentivize ignorance and stupidity by making it more painful, just like those natural pests disincentivize improper sanitation. By becoming knowledgable and savvy, the "victim" can have total control over whether he/she is successfully targeted.
Really now, all it would take is a small amount of healthy skepticism. Let's assume the scammer is so good that there are no other "tells". A user would only need to say to the scammer "Microsoft found a virus on my PC did they? Let me get back to you" and then call Microsoft. As unpleasant as calling Microsoft would be, it beats giving money to a scammer. It's the same well-known principle used for dealing with suspicious communications from banks. If you don't know if that e-mail is really from your bank because you don't have the technical skill to determine that, then you ignore it and call your bank at their published phone number. Then it doesn't matter if it's the most clever phishing e-mail in the world.
It doesn't exactly require a genius to understand these things. It just requires that one not leap blindly into what they do not understand while expecting a good result. That's general advice for life, not just computing. I personally believe that almost everyone is capable of understanding these simple concepts, they just can't be bothered to think. Perhaps they need a little incentive. Perhaps by providing one the scammers are serving a purpose, even though I fully agree with you that they are scumbags. That's why I'd liken them to a carrion-eater or a parasite.
It is a miracle that curiosity survives formal education. - Einstein
They disincentivize ignorance and stupidity by making it more painful, just like those natural pests disincentivize improper sanitation./quote?
Yet the only reason why we care to disincentivize ignorance and stupidity is because those scammers exist. Your logic is viciously circular. They need to exist to protect people from themselves?
I'm glad you raised this point. It's a good one, to be sure.
Being wise and savvy and seeking understanding is the natural state of human beings. The widespread ignorance and stupidity is what I might call "unnaturally natural". The proof is that by not viewing ignorance and gullibility as problems in need of correction, people leave themselves vulnerable to this type of scam. The scammers do not create this vulnerability. They merely capitalize on it. They see that something is out of order and that this creates room for them to operate. Otherwise their dubious "enterprise" would never get off the ground.
The ignorance and stupidity is a disease state. The scammers are the disease that can thrive in the environment of that disease state. They are symptoms, not the actual problem. It's absurdity itself to say that the only reason to eschew ignorance and stupidity is because these scammers exist. Have you no concept of how much better our world would be if ignorance and stupidity were not such powerful forces in shaping it?
The personal shortcomings that scammers exploit go far, far beyond computing. They also play important roles in politics, the economy, interpersonal relationships, you name it. It just so happens that computing provides a convenient entry point for that ignorance and stupidity to come under attack since it is generally encouraged in other realms like politics.
It is a miracle that curiosity survives formal education. - Einstein
A lot of it is psychological; users convince themselves that computers are too complicated for them to understand, so they are.
We had an app at work that ran on a Windows CE-based palmtop that nurses used to record patient notes on their visits and then synced back to a server when they got back to base. The users never had any problems with this at all. Then, when the palmtops were up for replacement, they swapped them out for notebooks running XP with exactly the same app (newer version, same UI) and sync process and suddenly none of the users were able to cope any more.
Despite the fact that the processes were identical, they saw the notebooks as "proper" computers as opposed to the palmtops that were just electronic notepads in their minds and they convinced themselves that as a proper computer it was too complex for them to understand. So much of the trouble with technology is users creating barriers in their own minds and it's largely of "our" own making for trying to convince users throughout the 90s that computers were easy to use and would do everything for them, when we all know that isn't true.
I'm out of mod points, but the above is very insightful. I can relate seeing, on many occasions, where a dead simple UI, no more complex than say that of an ATM, becomes utterly confounding just because it's being presented with a PC in sight. In one case: as long as the PC was hidden, and the UI was accessed via a touchscreen --- everything was fine. As soon as mouse, keyboard and the PC case became visible, people would say that "something broke" and that I should bring it back to the "way it was before". This was a big eye opener when it comes to usability: users are not rational. Not at all.
A successful API design takes a mixture of software design and pedagogy.
Actually, they kept calling me for weeks, every couple of days. Here's what actually happens.
It's a Bangladesh call centre.
They call up and say that a problem on my computer has been reported to them. Of course, I know this is not true. But one time, I went along with it to find out what they were up to.
They actually talk you through getting the windows event log up on the screen - and make you count the "error" entries. Of course there are error entries.
So, they say, that proves you have a problem. My parents, for example, would be completely convinced at this point.
Then they make you go to a web site, and download a remote control application. At that point I hung up. There is no way I'm giving control of my PC over to some whackjob on the phone.
They kept calling for about two weeks, every couple of days. We're on the do not call list - which in the UK means its illegal for them to call us. And they call asking for "Mr Bruce" after I answer - my wife's name and mine are different, and the phone is in her name.
The last time they called I asked to speak to their "manager" and I told them to look out the window because the police are coming to get them. What else am I going to do? Then they finally stopped calling.
It's the big secret of people who are 'knowledgeable' about computer.
50% of the time when 'help' someone do something, like send email...we don't know anything any more than they do. we're just reading the damn screen and doing what the logical thing would be, and we're not scared of doing the wrong thing. I mean, people ask me to help them send an attachment using a webmail system I'd never seen before:
Why don't you click on the 'Attach file' link there and select the file? Okay, where'd you save the file? Okay, select it, and then type something in the body, and press send. There you go. Yes, that's me, a computer genius, reading the screen like that and having the ability to use common dialog boxes.(1)
And another 25% of the time we're solving problems by applying basic computer knowledge. Like, very basic. Like 'able to learn in 10 hours' basic. Stuff like 'The World Wide Web works by your computer talking to another computer through even more computers.' and 'Video files tend to about 10 times as big as mp3s per minute.' and 'Wireless signals are often encrypted'.
And another 20% of the time it's stuff we've either run into before, and thus know what to do, or we fricking google it. Lacking the basic computer knowledge above just turns that 25% into this also. (I'm often like this on a Mac.)
There is almost no 'skill' involved at all. Half of it is just a willingness to say 'Okay, this looks right, let's try that'.
Only about 5% of the stuff people who are 'knowledgeable' about computers do for others as 'tech support', mainly stuff like buying/building computers, and programming, and other 'creative' stuff where you aren't fixing something that's broken, actually require any skill.
I mean, I have a younger brother who doesn't have any formal computer training outside of high school and an Office class for his associate degree. He's an auto mechanic.
But he grew up with a nerd and a half-nerd, so he knows how to operate his computer, and any questions from him are things like 'Should I go with AGP or should I pay more for PCI-E?' and 'This game is giving some sort of Direct X error on startup, and all I can find are suggestions to reinstall it and Direct X...which I've done. Ideas?'. This is because he learned 'the secret' to solve computer problems: Do the obvious thing, and if you don't know what that is, google what's wrong. And backup your computer so if it blows up, you can just reinstall.
1) Yes, yes, we've all fallen prey to the stupid inability to see things right in front of us, and someone else points it out instantly, but I'm not talking about that here.
If corporations are people, aren't stockholders guilty of slavery?