Was at my grandma's house and she got a rather technical call. She handed me the phone and obviously I was suspicious from the accents.
On to the meat and potatoes.
Since I am rather savvy in the computer world, I decided to play along and see where they were going to take it.
They started the call off by saying that they were X company and had been authorized by Microsoft to fix my because hackers have implanted malicious files that are "affecting my computer hard drive programs"....
Amused, I went along with it. These are the steps I went through;
Start
Right click" Computer"
Manage Computer
Event viewer
Filter view logs
Error and Warning messages only
Then he told me that I needed to select them all and DELETE these log files...
At this point, I was almost laughing hysterically (had to hit mute). Once I composed myself, I asked the gentleman to explain to me how deleting these log files (that are nothing but a log of what has transpired on the computer, zero control over whatever caused the error to begin with) would fix the errors on the computer since they are solely a log of what happened.
This confused him and he tried to spout the same script as earlier trying to scare me into by reiterating that a hacker has been in my computer and I need to delete the files to fix the issue. After I told him that I wouldn't be deleting these logs (and 3 more times trying to scare me) he handed me to a "supervisor". He also didn't actually have a firm grasp of what was going on and said the same things. Finally, I got handed to a "James Robinson" who was also Indian (as in an actual Indian, not a Native American) however he had IMPECCABLE command of the English language.
So, I explained the situation a 6th time and he sounded confident (actually understood that the log files wouldn't actually do anything). So then he said we could move on without deleting the logs and move onto the "actual fix". I said ok (still laughing under my breath) and said alright, what's next. And he was sorta silent so I stated said, "cool what's next? Unless you want me to relinquish control via Remote Desktop Sharing..." He said that is exactly what was needed. So I lost all composure and (still laughing) said that that wasn't gonna happen. He hung up.
--Thoughts--
I highly doubt these were "the hackers" that had "hacked my computer." s end goal being to give them control of your computer using the Remote Desktop Sharing wizard.
Was at my grandma's house and she got a rather technical call. She handed me the phone and obviously I was suspicious from the accents.
On to the meat and potatoes.
Since I am rather savvy in the computer world, I decided to play along and see where they were going to take it.
They started the call off by saying that they were X company and had been authorized by Microsoft to fix my because hackers have implanted malicious files that are "affecting my computer hard drive programs"....
Amused, I went along with it. These are the steps I went through;
Start
Right click" Computer"
Manage Computer
Event viewer
Filter view logs
Error and Warning messages only
Then he told me that I needed to select them all and DELETE these log files...
At this point, I was almost laughing hysterically (had to hit mute). Once I composed myself, I asked the gentleman to explain to me how deleting these log files (that are nothing but a log of what has transpired on the computer, zero control over whatever caused the error to begin with) would fix the errors on the computer since they are solely a log of what happened.
This confused him and he tried to spout the same script as earlier trying to scare me into by reiterating that a hacker has been in my computer and I need to delete the files to fix the issue. After I told him that I wouldn't be deleting these logs (and 3 more times trying to scare me) he handed me to a "supervisor". He also didn't actually have a firm grasp of what was going on and said the same things. Finally, I got handed to a "James Robinson" who was also Indian (as in an actual Indian, not a Native American) however he had IMPECCABLE command of the English language.
So, I explained the situation a 6th time and he sounded confident (actually understood that the log files wouldn't actually do anything). So then he said we could move on without deleting the logs and move onto the "actual fix". I said ok (still laughing under my breath) and said alright, what's next. And he was sorta silent so I stated said, "cool what's next? Unless you want me to relinquish control via Remote Desktop Sharing..." He said that is exactly what was needed. So I lost all composure and (still laughing) said that that wasn't gonna happen. He hung up.
--Thoughts--
I highly doubt these were "the hackers" that had "hacked my computer." s end goal being to give them control of your computer using the Remote Desktop Sharing wizard.
Caller type: Scammer
Company: Authorized by Microsoft
Number: 844-455-0655
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