“It begins with a simple phone call. A scratchy voice, often sounding distant and foreign, introduces the caller as ‘John,’ or ‘Steven,’ but the accent suggests otherwise,” Kirk McElhearn reports for Intego. “The caller claims to be calling from Microsoft tech support, and says that there’s a problem with your computer. If you say that you have a Mac, they either hang up or say, ‘Yes, sorry, you have a Mac.'”
“And so begins an attempt at social engineering (social hacking), a way of conning people into allowing an unknown person to access their computer, possibly copy files, and eventually getting them to pay for this ‘tech support,'” McElhearn reports. “The scammer strings the user along, leads them to supposed ‘error’ messages and malware files on their computer, and gets them to install software allowing the scammer to access their files.”
“Even though Microsoft recently stated that only 183,000 had reported this type of scam to the company in 2017, that’s probably just a fraction of the number of people who get contacted; it’s a very common scam,” McElhearn reports. “If you’re reading this, you probably already know about these social engineering scams. What’s important is that you tell others—your friends and family, especially older, less tech-savvy people—about this, so they know that when the scammer calls, they should just hang up.”
Read more in the full article here.
MacDailyNews Take: “Sorry, you have a Mac. You’re too smart for me to prey upon.”
SEE ALSO:
The Microsoft Tax: How to avoid the WannaCry virus if you’re slumming it with Windows on your Mac – May 17, 2017
Microsoft faulted over massive ransomware cyberattack – May 16, 2017
North Korea thought to be behind worldwide cyber attack on Windows PCs – May 15, 2017
Tim Cook’s refusal to create iPhone backdoor for FBI vindicated by ‘WannaCry’ ransomware attack on Windows PCs – May 15, 2017
The Microsoft Tax: Rapidly replicating Windows PC worm spreads as experts try to limit damage; Macintosh unaffected – May 15, 2017
The Microsoft Tax: Leaked NSA malware hijacks Windows PCs worldwide; Macintosh unaffected – May 13, 2017
USB Kill 2.0 can destroy any Windows PC in seconds, Apple Macintosh unaffected – September 12, 2016
The Microsoft Tax: Malicious worm on Skype lets hackers hold Windows PCs for ransom; Macintosh unaffected – October 10, 2012
The Microsoft Tax: Critical Windows flaw affects millions of high-value PCs with self-replicating attacks – March 13, 2012
The Microsoft Tax: Virus infects Windows PC control systems of US Predator and Reaper drones – October 8, 2011
The Microsoft Tax: ‘Indestructible’ botnet attacks millions of Windows PCs; Macintosh unaffected – July 1, 2011
The Microsoft tax: Stuxnet computer worm infects Microsoft’s porous Windows OS; Mac unaffected – September 27, 2010
The Microsoft Tax: New undetectable Windows trojan empties bank accounts worldwide; Mac unaffected – August 11, 2010
The Microsoft Tax: Windows zero-day flaw exposes users to code execution attack; Mac unaffected – August 09, 2010
The Microsoft Tax: Critical flaw lets hackers take remote control of Windows PCs; Mac unaffected – August 07, 2010
The Microsoft Tax: New attack bypasses every Windows XP security product tested; Mac unaffected – May 11, 2010
The Microsoft Tax: McAfee correctly identifies Windows as malware; Macintosh unaffected – April 21, 2010
The Microsoft Tax: DNS Windows PC Trojan poses as iPhone unlock utility; Mac and iPhone unaffected – April 15, 2010
The Microsoft Tax: 1-in-10 Windows PCs still vulnerable to Conficker worm; Macintosh unaffected – April 08, 2010
The Microsoft Tax: 74,000 Windows PCs in 2,500 companies attacked globally; Mac users unaffected – February 18, 2010
The Microsoft Tax: Widespread attacks exploit Internet Explorer flaw; Macintosh unaffected – January 22, 2010
The Microsoft Tax: Windows 7 zero-day flaw enables attackers to cripple PCs; Macintosh unaffected – November 16, 2009
The Microsoft Tax: Windows 7 flaw allows attackers to remotely crash PCs; Macintosh unaffected – November 12, 2009
The Microsoft Tax: Windows virus delivers child porn to PCs, users go to jail; Mac users unaffected – November 09, 2009
The Microsoft Tax: Worms infest Windows PCs worldwide; Mac users unaffected – November 02, 2009
The Microsoft Tax: Banking Trojan horse steals money from Windows sufferers; Mac users unaffected – September 30, 2009
The Microsoft Tax: Serious Windows security flaw lets hackers to take over PCs; Macintosh unaffected – July 07, 2009
The Microsoft Tax: Windows Conficker worm hits hospital devices; Macintosh unaffected – April 29, 2009
The Microsoft Tax: Conficker virus begins to attack Windows PCs; Macintosh unaffected – April 27, 2009
The Microsoft Tax: Conficker’s estimated economic cost: $9.1 billion – April 24, 2009
We got a call from what the said was Apple Inc to tell us our iCloud account had been hacked.. Frightening that they had info handy on us and they insisted (in a strong Indian accent) that they were from Apple – they would not give up.. Didn’t give them any info and we had to finally hang up and then he called back 2 more times right away.. They are getting tougher to get rid of.. Ugh!
Nah, don’t hang up on them, just string them along for as long as you can. I have so much fun with these idiots like asking where the key and all sorts of stuff to drive them nuts and waste their time lol.
We did string them along for a while but I couldn’t listen any more..
It’s an opportunity to play!
“Shall I go get my credit card to pay you for this service?”
Or: “yes, I’m in front of my machine right now…do you need my password to assist me?”
Or: “I’m glad you called…I’ve been experiencing issues with my machine this morning. I think I’ve been hacked by the Russians.”
“Waste their time.” And yours. I have a life, I scream at them and hang up. One time they called again and screamed back. Very unprofessional.
Doesn’t have to waste your time… Check these guys out!!!
http://www.jollyrogertelco.com
A couple of hours wasted of there time for one…..
OMG that sounds like the same guy.. LOL
Any idiot that falls for this, probably deserves to be scammed.
If you want to listen to something related to this topic that is truly hysterical, download the following podcast:
https://itunes.apple.com/us/podcast/reply-all/id941907967?mt=2&i=1000390370460
And get episode 102
The podcast host does a superb job of stringing along the poor sap from India. The podcast host then digs until he finds the scammer’s phone number, and then calls them mutilple times a day every single day. The part where the scammer says in a downtrodden voice, “Alex, you’ve got to stop calling us” is PRICELESS.
I love the “you have a virus” scam, and I walk them along the garden path as long as I can. Depending on the mood, I’ll even tell them that I just bought a virus program but I forgot to turn it on, hold on it should be working any minute.
Then I give them the sound of success full blast.
I have a friend with a bit of a hearing impairment. If she suspects that a call is from a call centre, she explains about her impairment and explains that she should be contacted by email, text or post.
When the caller asks for her email address, she pretends that she can’t understand the accent or the question and says “Anybody who knows who I am will have my alternative contact details on file. Anybody who doesn’t have my details already available is making an unsolicited call and i am unable to help via the phone.”
“Where in India are you located?” is a great start to deal with these guys. Usually resulting in hang-up. If they don’t, I do.
After about 10-15 min of stringing along my ‘Microsoft tech support rep’ who had informed me that my computer had been hacked, he finally concluded that I had a Mac since I was having so much problems locating the ‘start menu’…”do you have an apple in the top left hand corner?” he asked. When I confirmed, he said “wait a minute and I’ll transfer you to Apple”…about 10 seconds later I was speaking to Apple…! I said it was so good that they were working so closely together to solve these hacking issues. =) I strung her along for another 10-15 minutes before I got tired of finding ways to keep her occupied. She did have me open the terminal and type in ‘netstat’ and then try to convince me that all of those IP addresses I saw under “foreign addresses” proved that my Mac had been hacked…lol