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Turning the Tables On "Phone Tech Support" Scammers
mask.of.sanity writes A security pro has released a Metasploit module that can take over computers running the Ammyy Admin remote control software popular among "Hi this is Microsoft, there's a problem with your computer" tech support scammers. The hack detailed in Matthew Weeks' technical post works from the end-user, meaning victims can send scammers the hijacking exploit when they request access to their machines. Victims should provide scammers with their external IP addresses rather than their Ammyy identity numbers as the exploit was not yet built to run over the Ammyy cloud, according to the exploit readme. This is much more efficient than just playing along but "accidentally" being unable to follow their instructions.
Providing your own IP address to a criminal so you can trash their computer just doesn't sound like a good plan to me.
I will love reading about anyone who managed to destroy a call centre of these scammers and get them out of business.
Myself, I would fear bad legal consequences if I did it, because hacking into their computers isn't going to be legal just because they are scammers.
Now telling them that you just hacked into their computers and asking them to open log files to show evidence, that would be fun.
THEM: Hi this is Microsoft and...
US: hang up
Done. Fuck this war.
Politics; n. : A religion whereby man is god.
Them: Hi This is Microsoft. You have a problem on your desktop
Me: Oh! Wow! how do we fix it?
Them: Do you see your START button?
Me: (Looking over my Gnome Desktop on my Fedora workstation...) No.
Them: Just look on you lower left.
Me: I have ACTIVITIES on the upper Left.
Them: That must be it. Pull down the menu from that START Button.
Me: OK
Them: Do you see the RUN item
Me: No...
And they get more and more frustrated by this looser who can't seem to work the START menu.
I really try to follow their instructions.
After all they said that they had analyzed my machine and knew exactly how to fix it. They MUST know what they are doing then.
You mean that, maybe, possibly, thay were not completely truthfull???
I'm always surprised by how people can be scared into using this service. I'm the NA for the largest private GP clinic in the state of Montana and I still have quite a few old customers call me from back when I ran my own tech service company. People who I would consider "smart" or "less-than-scamable" have fallen time after time from this exploit and handed over personal information and pretty chunky sums of money. No matter what you've done in the past to help educate or bring people up to speed on current scams it never is enough. The lack of deep understanding of technology seems to render even the most reasonable person inept.
I always get the statement "In the back of my mind I knew this seemed a little fishy, but the other day I was having trouble with X and then Microsoft called. I figured they knew!". Part of me wants to blame the current news reports of the NSA and how they are passing around the watercooler your email about how your last batch of zucchini made the best pickles... your everyday man thinks that Microsoft or these huge companies like Google are literally standing over your shoulder examining your every move. Hell, of course Microsoft knows about your problem with that Outlook plug in that keeps crashing on startup... they've been watching you for the last 2 weeks daily!
All it's doing is funding my side business and bringing me a stream of easy to fix computers at $80/hr. Maybe I should send these guys a cut of the cash.
"Hi, we've detected a virus on your machine etc etc"
"Yes, that's mine, I've been testing it. Can you tell me how and when it was detected please?"
".....[click]beeeeeeeeeeeeeeee"
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"Hi, we've detected a virus on your machine etc etc"
"How do you know?"
"We have a file about you and your computer."
"Yea? What's my name?"
".....[click]beeeeeeeeeeeeeeee"
Them: Hello, this is Microsoft. We have detected a problem with your computer.
Me: Really? And you're calling to help me?
Them: Yes of course. Do you see your "start" button?
Me: No I don't see any "start" button.
Them: It's in the lower left corner.
Me: I have a button in the upper left corner that says "OS/2 Warp"
Them: Asshole. (hangs up)
Get free satoshi (Bitcoin) and Dogecoins
Scammers, by definition, do not follow the law. What makes you think they'd concern themselves with something as petty as a Do No call law?
And yes, you should consider yourself lucky. These kinds of calls are becoming more frequent and MUCH more aggressive. I had one scammer call me back over a hundred times in one day when I hung up on him. I eventually just routed all incoming calls to my fax machine.
"Tell me doctor, with all of your defenses, are there any provisions for an attack by killer bees?"
One thing Microsoft could do easily and cheaply, which would eventually end this "Calling you from Windows and you have a virus" scam, is to have a short mention about this being a scam on the front page of their website. A single sentence would suffice.
When you get called by the indian call center employee, who for most of them believe they are working for a legitimate business, mention how the caller is NOT really affiliated with Microsoft because their website say it's a scam. "See for yourself !" and hang up.
The actual pirates can probably not do the mass phone call themselves and still rack up enough money, which is why they hire call centres to do it for them, and why they also take precautions to show them some pretense of legitimacy. If the call centres stop working with them they'll go away.
Maybe we deserve this world ?
I've had a similar experience - many times.
First of I am not a lawyer - but I can read Wikipedia :-)
So when we get to "we've detected a problem with your computer" I ask "how?" and get a stream of babble about seeing data which looks like a virus.
Then I ask innocently -- "so you can look at my traffic?" "oh yes and you definitely have a virus - we can see from how your PC is behaving" "so you can look at my PC?" "Oh yes"
I always ask - "are you sure about this?" to allow them to dig themselves even deeper into a hole and then ask for their name/company name (claiming I misheard at the start).
At this point I inform them that either (a) they are probably committing offences under one or more of Computer Misuse Act 1990, Data Protection Act 1998 or Regulation of Investigatory Powers Act 2000 -- or (b) if they want to own up (and I do know that they are lying because I'm not running Windows and my firewall is pretty tight) that attempting to obtain money through false pretences is an offence under the Fraud Act 2006.
"Which one do you want to choose?"
They usually hang up at this point having spent around 15 minutes with me when they could have been hitting another victim -- though one did ring back and shout abuse.
If it's anything like how they pronounce lieutenant, then I don't know how British pronounce Brighton either.
Like "Bright" with "on" at the end.
Them: Hello, this is Microsoft. We have detected a problem with your computer.
Me: Really?
Them: Yes of course. Do you see your "start" button?
Me: No
Them: It's in the lower left corner.
Me:The lower left corner of what ?
Them: The lower left corner of your computer.
Me: The lower left corner?...........when viewed from where ?
Them: From the front.
Me: OK, let me see.....All I see is a little sticker that says Intel Inside on the lower left corner.
Them: I don't understand.
Me: The computer has a little sticker on the lower left corner. but no start button.
Them: No, I mean the lower left corner of your monitor.
Me: Wait I'll have a look..........I don't have a start button on the lower left corner of my monitor either. I do see a little sticker that says "Infant Optics" (it's a baby monitor) Them: click
I had a "Microsoft" guy walk me through installing TeamViewer. After twenty minutes of goofing with him, I said it was installed (which it already was).. When he asked for my team viewer ID, I asked for him to give me his ID first. They didn't and were mad I wasted their time. But.. it makes me think that the TeamViewer company might be able help track down these jerks.
I like to get these scammers on the line for as long as possible, but without wasting my time. So far, what I've seen to work well was "Oh, my computer just crashed, I need to reboot" and "Now windows is applying updates". This means they'll wait without me having to think of stuff to tell them. Any other effective tricks?
Opus: the Swiss army knife of audio codec
I never have these guys calling me, but several of the stories here mention these guys shouting profanity and abuse. I wonder if it is some sort of defense mechanism to keep themselves from realizing how low they are to be using these fraudulent tactics on innocent people.
I've taken to asking them questions like:
Does your mother know that you spend your days trying to steal money from people much like her? How does she feel about that?
How does it feel knowing that every minute you're at work, you're making the world a worse place to live? Do you sleep well at night?
etc.
I once had the employee's manager call me to chew me out for making the employee feel bad. Hopefully he quit.
Well played.
Lost at C:>. Found at C.
I keep an old XP laptop loaded with furry porn, pictures of cows and pigs being slaughtered, BDSM porn, transsexual midget porn, stuff from rotten.com/ogrish like beheadings, gential mutilation, etc., set on random rotate every second for the desktop with a nice fading transition, everything locked except the remote assistance tool, and when they call I put that machine live and let them in.
The extortion begins, and then they see something that invariably offends the piss out of them while they're forced to watch a constantly-changing desktop wallpaper they can't stop, and the extortion ends with me laughing in their ears.
Endless entertainment. I even got a "You're the sickest thing existing on this planet." from some chick that was playing the scam.
I lol'd hard at that one.
Still waiting on Serviscope_minor to wake up to fucking reality and realize that Jessica Price isn't going to fuck him.
Had one Indian woman claiming she was Dave from Microsoft...
Donald 'Duck' Dunn: We had a band powerful enough to turn goat piss into gasoline.
That's because they're monitoring your computer and know you're out to scam them.
APK quotes people (including myself) without context and should not be trusted. Just thought you should know.
ugh, this is a real disgrace on India. I think this scamming here is frequent from India because there is little to no regulation, law or enforcement of it if there were one about scamming 'foreigners'.
This is how most of the Indian GDP were composed of.
It is part of their culture. In the university that I went to, 90% of the Indians are cheating. This is in a electrical engineering master's program.
That's why our organization will not hire any H1Bs.
New Economic Perspectives
Yeah, that's even better. These people that are talking about hanging out on the phone with these creeps have me baffled. Even if you look at it in the same light as biological war, eventually not just outright killing (hang up the phone) the virus (the creeps), provides a way for the virus (the creeps) to gain some bits of immunity (understanding) of the treatment (logic of keeping them on the phone in order to waste the creep's time) and thus provides them a sort of way to plan how to deal with it. And in that light, they're actually making things harder for not only the already gullible, but also for the ones that want to play these games.
Politics; n. : A religion whereby man is god.
It's fun to tell them you have 23 computers and insist they tell you which one is infected.
And that you're replying at all.... *WOOSH*
APK quotes people (including myself) without context and should not be trusted. Just thought you should know.
I have been using the "Yes..and" Improv method of Step In.
"What? Again? My damn kid put a virus on the computer again? Boy!! Get your Ass down here now... yes you... talk to this guy... WTF (whack)" [pull phone away from head, change voice "No Dad, that hurts, let go, stop, ow ow" "You get the phone with this guy right now and fix this.... and after we're going to have a talk...."
or -- two old people "Ethel - do you understand what this guy wants? Something about a computer... hmm.. our grandson was over last week. Hold on while I get him"
or -- "Oh - I've been waiting for you to call. See I have this problem where....."
of course if I'm in a rush I just say, "I have a Mac" and they hang up immediately. Seriously.. click.
My record was 16 minutes, the sucker on the other end got more and more frustrated and eventually swore at me and hung up.
I've told them I can't go to my computer because I had a broken leg and couldn't get out of bed.
I've told them I don't have a keyboard, I use a touchscreen.
Most recently, I let the operator get through to the stage where they wanted to connect, then I told her I knew it was a scam, she should be ashamed of herself for telling lies, and what would her mother think? That one got 3 seconds of silence, "shit", then she hung up.
They sentenced me to twenty years of boredom
They never seem to call me. I have a clean XP VM all setup ready to go to have them remote into. They do however call my parents (Asking for me by name somehow, my name must be linked with that number). Despite being non-technical, that doesn't prevent my father from screwing with them the old fashioned way. He usually keeps them on the line, saying things like "I already have a Window cleaner, he comes by on Tuesdays and does a good job! Even does the 2nd story windows!" He'll usually tag them along for a good 10 minutes or so. 50/50 change of them ending without incident, the other half they usually scream some swears or insult then hang up. The last time, when he had enough, the scammer asked "What is on your computer screen?" and my father replies "Oh! t's all pictures of naked woman!" The scammer then replied "Oh! That must be your mother! You mother f****er!" then hangs up. They are the ones calling and scamming, and the attitudes these people have are amazing. Some other fun tricks to try is talking in another language. My parents can speak basic French, and occasionally they confuse these scammers, who barley speak English, by talking French and it really throws them off.