Just spent almost one hour on the phone with "I'm from Microsoft and your computer has a virus" scammers.
My third call this year, all from India with obvious Indian accents. Sorry vireya, I know you feel left out.
****They were insistent on taking remote control of the computer, and spent the entire call trying to do that over and over again.
They hung up only after trying many times and with 4-5 different "employees" to get remote access
Several people have commented that they think taking remote access is just "for show", a gimmick to convince you they are from Microsoft, and the real scam comes when they try to charge you for fixing the problem, or sell you a service agreement.
I'm convinced that was not the case with these scammers. Taking remote control of the computer was their key and only strategy. They must have been trying to place a virus, malware or something on my computer.
They had me press the Windows key and R. That opens a box that says "Type the name of a program....."
They had me type in www.us13.cu.cc
That brings up TeamViewerQS.exe, which they had me double click on
That takes you to TeamViewer, a program for them to take remote control of your computer.
You run the program, and the TeamViewer then gives you a 9 digit ID and password. They have you read them the 9 digit ID and password so they can enter it and take remote control.
I gave them an incorrect 9 digit ID so they would not be able to take control of my computer. They entered it into the program and TeamViewer told them "The Team Viewer ID does not exist". They had me go thru this over and over.
Then they had me go to www.ammyy.com
Which is AMMYY Remote Desktop Software and Remote Desktop Connection
When I clicked to download it, McAfee blocked it. They then spent a long time trying to get me to stop McAfee from blocking that program. They were trying to take me thru the steps to disable McAfee, which I faked going along with but did not do.
During the call I was transferred 3-4 times to higher level persons. Each time the next person spoke better English and was more sophisticated.
Reading them an incorrect ID seems to be a good way to frustrate them.
They kept having to confer with their supervisors to figure out why this wasn't working.
Finally they asked me to shut down the computer, and restart it in Safe Mode.
I told them I was working on too many files and was not able to shut the computer down at this time. He tried very hard to convince me to shut down the computer and start it in Safe Mode, but I would not comply.
Then they hung up.
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