Telephone / Internet Scams

I got this as an e mail the other day . Luckily I know better and also the senders e mail is totally wrong was the first thing that alerted me

I would love to let these scammers take remote control of my computer .I would have a folder marked BANK containing some really nasty viruses. Unfortunately, I don't know how to set this up.

I had an automated spam call pretending to be BT this morning.

I sent the number to Action Fraud but I don't expect much.

Neil

I had a call allegedly from BT (I am a BT customer), claiming I had viruses on my PC. I asked the caller's name, "Jonathan Smith" he says in a heavy Indian accent. I've had quite a lot of dealings with BT support over the years, so the Indian accent wasn't enough to put me off. Ignoring his questions, I asked what dept he was from and where the office was. Realising he'd been rumbled, he said "Mars". I replied "Ooh, I didn't know BT had a Mars office. How interesting!". I was about to hit him with a barrage of Mars-related questions when he hung up. Boo!

Have a trawl around https://www.scammer.info/

Make sure you run a VM and have spoof phone numbers and e-mail address.

More advice here https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCBNG0osIBAprVcZZ3ic84vw

Hi

I hope that most are aware that there is another scam circulating. Email purportedly coming from the TV Licensing Authority stating that they are having trouble processing a payment. One I received was poorly written and clearly a scam but the other looked convincing and could easily fool the unwary, I believe that there was a case recently where someone lost a fair bit of money to this scam.

The give away is the sender's email address and the fact that I don't need a licence being an old crinkly scrote.

Cheers

Grey/Bald & Aged

AKA: - MartinW

I get a text alert every month from o2 saying my latest statement is online but this week I got one saying that I'd used a premium number outside my tariff (I hadn't) and to click on a link beginning http://s.o2..... Obviously I didn't but the unnerving part is that it came into the same folder with the other genuine o2 texts so the scam is mimicking o2 as the sender.

Edited By Chris Trice on 10/01/2019 14:43:31

Had one yesterday supposedly from TalkTalk, sayng my DD had failed and would I give my acct. details/

No way would i do that. A quick chat to talktalk soon found that my acct was OK.

Talk talk have an address where you can report phishing attempts.

Often they know about it, since you are not the first to report it.

Howard

Apart from the two (Two!) calls from 'BT' yesterday threatening to cut me off, as they have been doing for months, I got an English voice asking if I had taken out a plan to protect against spam phone calls. As this provision only came into force on Monday, they are quick off the mark. I asked after the cost, and he said 39p per week. I told him that was £20 a year for something that is allegedly free, ... and he cut me off.

Gentlemen,

If I get emails I dont recognise they are deleted but what amazes me is the no of phone calls people answer, I've had call guardian for several years and only get calls that I'm expecting or are family and friends, the phone blocks the rest, I've had five unidentified calls this week that were blocked and except for two single digit calls the other three were identified as scam no's on the internet one being from BT allegidly.

Martin P

It would appear that if you make enough calls trying to outwit people then someone will get by. Recent case was the TV Licence scam where a couple went through the internet and selected a site who then skimmed them for £10.000.

Be internet savvy, query anything that seems not right. In any case, a cold call or an email out of the blue is not true!

Clive

What am I doing correctly?, I rarely get scam emails or phone calls as described in this thread!!

Luck perhaps? Despite keeping a low profile and having a hardened system I get dodgy emails - they started after a friend forwarded one of those 'joke' emails to me and a bunch of other mates. By sending the email all our addresses were blind copied to the original sender, who sold them on. Please don't copy funny ha ha email junk to your friends!

A colleague who ran his own mail server was able to use a slightly different address each time he shared on the internet. By monitoring which aliases got spammed he was able to identify which businesses were selling his details on. (Later this became illegal) In addition, many legitimate companies have lost customer details to hackers, as in this example. Don't use free wifi access to conduct sensitive business without a VPN - wifi hot points are easily monitored. Don't use unencrypted wifi at home either.

There isn't a policeman patrolling the internet unless you're buying guns, drugs or porn. In the UK the Information Commissioner chooses not to act proactively - they intervene AFTER your data has been lost, and are unsupportive if you ask for confirmation that an organisation actually has appropriate security in place. As good security is expensive it's common for IT systems to be inadequately protected at any of several key points - risk assessment, policy, design, build, maintenance, networking, processes, management, ethics, or staff management. Hackers are rather expert in exploiting IT weaknesses caused by corner cutting.

Safe enough with reasonable precautions but the price of peace is eternal vigilance.

Dave

Whats VPN

Thank you I googled VPN to try and understand it but it spoke of IP addresses and Servers, now I'm not daft but why do I have to fiddle with those.

It just seems like another piece of software thats been created to earn money.

Martin P

As I had to get a new email after the withdrawal of my old freeserve one I have only given it to bona fide businesses and people who really need it, I have a minimal amount of spam now. My landline has always been ex directory and again only given out on a need to know basis, unsolicited calls are rare which is a shame as I quite enjoy a bit of sport with the muppets on the other end. I had a genuine call from my bank one day and it makes their life difficult when you test them but the lady was happy to answer any questions that would prove it was a genuine call. It was a shame I had to return my work mobile when I retired as I used to get quite a few entertaining calls about my accident that I never had.

Mike

Since the change in the law where websites now have to ask you to accept their cookies, it's interesting when exploring the cookie settings of such websites how much information they want and to who they're passing it on to. Pretty much every website does it which means a buck is being made along the way. Those that allow me to deny all such requests get my patronage. Those that do not, get no traffic from me. Some do allow you to deny all cookie requests but will still let you read the website (BBC News for example) but the most annoying are those that instantly throw up an "Accept Cookies" window that obscures what you've come to look at with no option to decline. I hit the back button straight away. I've also set up a couple of bogus name email addresses I give to those I suspect will spam me (a) to avoid having to see it and (b) to identify which organisations have passed my information on to the spammers. Last night was an example. Toby Carvery are currently offering a 40% discount if you give them your details. Using my mobile, I found their webpage, gave them the bogus email address, they showed me the discount code on the same application page which I passed on to the waitress and then I deleted the page without completing. Consumers 1, Spammers 0.

Mike despite having elected for my landline number to be ex-directory it still appears to be included in directories, and despite being registered with TPS I still get a few scammers calling, particularly the you’ve had an accident brigade. Having caller display on my landline I now always check the numbers of callers if I don’t recognise then I don’t answer. I now use my mobile for any telephone communications and fortunately to date it is free of nuisance callers.

Dave W

Mick and Martin, VPNs do actually provide important safeguards for people in certain countries. We are lucky that our need for them in the UK is not so acute:

Link