Tech Support Scams

Welcome to The Safety Net, a newsletter that profiles scams and helps you protect your family from them. If you like this issue, please share it with anyone who might like it. Thanks!

From the perspective of a scammer, the hardest part of a scam is convincing you to fall for it. If they could remove you from the equation, and just steal from you without your involvement, scams would be easy! To do that, they would need to get control of your computer so they could pretend to be you. 

Sounds hard? Unfortunately not. 

Below is a real scam message, which likely looks like real messages you might have received:

The goal of these messages is to scare you into calling their phone number. In this case they are using the fear of a $384 charge, and in other cases they will claim your computer has a virus or is not working properly. They will go to great lengths to get you on the phone.

If they get you on the phone, they will sound just like support from companies. They will encourage you to download and install something that will help them fix the problem remotely. NEVER INSTALL REMOTE ACCESS SOFTWARE. Once you install the remote control software, they have control of your computer and no longer need you to complete the scam. They will just start stealing your money, identity, etc. while you don’t even realize until it’s too late.

Generally speaking, tech support does not need you to install third party software to fix problems. Even if they did, you should verify that they are from the company they claim to be instead of trusting them. An easy way to do that is to look up the customer support number on their website and call them yourself. 

The only one using your computer should be you and the people you know. Don’t make it easier for the scammers by giving them access too. 

Join the Sanctum Waiting List! 

We’re in the process of building a suite of tools that will keep you safer online, including protecting you from scams. You can see a quick video about what we’re building, and we’d love for you to join our waitlist for early access if you’re interested.

Quick Tip of the Week: Call Them Back

When you get a phone call, your phone tells you who it’s from right? Not always. It’s very easy to spoof phone numbers, so that a scammer can appear to be a legitimate company. 

If you get a call from someone claiming to be from a company, ask if you can call them back. They can give you the number and extensions to reach them, which you can verify as legitimate before calling them back. If they won’t let you call them back, hang up as it’s likely a scam. 

Have you come across a scam recently? Received some weird messages that you think might be a scam? Forward them to [email protected] and we’re happy to help! We’ll take a look and let you know what we think, and if it is a scam we’ll profile it in future issues of The Safety Net to protect others.