Scam Phonecalls about your Computer or Laptop

For some who have just read the heading you have just lost interest in reading any more. I fully understand, it will never happen to you. That’s great and I applaud you, but can you say the same for your friends and relatives, particularly the older ones? With that in mind, can I ask you to read on and then share this with them or even pass it to them.

In recent years the criminal element of the world has turned its attention to extorting money from computer users by convincing them there is a problem with their computer or, in a new twist, with their broadband. There are potentially two types of call you can receive:
“Hello, I am calling from Microsoft to tell you your computer is reporting that it has errors and is running slow. I will help you sort these out. Please turn your computer on and I will fix the problems and speed up your computer.”
Or
“Hello, I am calling from BT. Your broadband connection is running slow because your computer has viruses and is sending things out across the internet. I can help you stop this happening. Is your computer on?”

In both instances this is a pack of lies. What these fraudsters are preying on is the fact that many people consider their computer or laptop runs slow and most people also believe their broadband to be slow. If you think about this logically, how hard is it to get a broadband supplier to help you when you have a problem? What ridiculous lengths do you have to go to in order to get an engineer out? Yet here they are ringing you and offering to help? No, it is not improved customer service, it is opportunism by criminals.

These charlatans want to get on your computer so they can try and find email addresses and passwords, account details and personal information, which they can use or sell, while at the same time trying to give you the impression they helping you by cleaning and tidying your PC, for which they charge a ridiculous amount of money. They sound VERY plausible and VERY believable, but it is all a SCAM.

What should you do then? Don’t just hang up as they will keep calling back, but rather make them hang up on you. Tell them you don’t have a computer or laptop, that usually sees them off. Tell them you know they are fraudsters and you are not going to allow them on their computer; that also gets rid of them, but I have heard tell of the caller getting abusive before hanging up, so beware. The most important thing is NOT to let them on your computer or laptop as who knows what will happen.