Waxing_Gibbous
05-02-2011, 05:31 PM
Not as bad as flood or fire, but worth knowing about.
Someone with a heavy Indian accent calls perporting to be from Microsoft.
Asks you to open various logs and tells you a lot of crap about how your computer is infected etc. etc.
Full details are available here:
http://www.techworld.com.au/article/314295/windows_event_viewer_phishing_scam_ remains_active/
It almost had me fooled as I had been on the phone to Microsoft earlier in the week and they have called me back twice. Some of the tasks I've had to do involve the same actions as the scammers.
But:
-Its a weekend. MS telephone support only runs Mon-Fri.
-The caller. "Marshall" tried to convince me that a low performance log indicated that hackers were corrupting my system. In reality , it means that your computer is only ticking over.
Marshall's phone number (02 8003 7528) only lead back to Marshall. Of course he gave me the legit No. for MS as well, but see above!
-They said if any parts of the system were password protected. they would have to make a 'small' one-time only charge. MS doesn't charge for this sort of thing.
BEWARE!
Hope this is a useful heads-up.
Kudos to Techworld as well for having the arcticle so easily referenced.
Peter
Someone with a heavy Indian accent calls perporting to be from Microsoft.
Asks you to open various logs and tells you a lot of crap about how your computer is infected etc. etc.
Full details are available here:
http://www.techworld.com.au/article/314295/windows_event_viewer_phishing_scam_ remains_active/
It almost had me fooled as I had been on the phone to Microsoft earlier in the week and they have called me back twice. Some of the tasks I've had to do involve the same actions as the scammers.
But:
-Its a weekend. MS telephone support only runs Mon-Fri.
-The caller. "Marshall" tried to convince me that a low performance log indicated that hackers were corrupting my system. In reality , it means that your computer is only ticking over.
Marshall's phone number (02 8003 7528) only lead back to Marshall. Of course he gave me the legit No. for MS as well, but see above!
-They said if any parts of the system were password protected. they would have to make a 'small' one-time only charge. MS doesn't charge for this sort of thing.
BEWARE!
Hope this is a useful heads-up.
Kudos to Techworld as well for having the arcticle so easily referenced.
Peter