6 ms·

I've been called by some "Windows support" three times during last month. The first time I didn't have the time to talk to them but the second time I took the t

by jeena 10y ago

I've been called by some "Windows support" three times during last month. The first time I didn't have the time to talk to them but the second time I took the time to do so. Somehow, even though I don't have a windows computer, I was able to fake it for about 10 minutes that I am following his instructions and doing what he tells me. First I had to press Win+r, which I didn't really know what it did, but I suspected it opened the CMD, so I told him that a new window opened, a black one. Then he spelled to me what I should write (I don't remember what, I didn't have anything to write with me). Then he asked me if I had Chrome installed, I said yes and he spelled a website url to me. I told him that it loaded and there was a "Download" button and asked if I should click it. He said yes. Then he talked me through how to install it, from his description I got that it was TeamViewer. He told me to start it, bare in mind that this was painfully slow for both of us because I had to come up with plausible mistake to make and had to think of some plausible but generic answers on the way because he always asked me what I'm seeing on the streen now. After I "started" it I had to tell him that in fact I didn't have a computer in front of me, but I only was playing along with his script. He stopped for a couple of seconds and then he asked me: "How is this possible ...? Why are you waisting my time??"

Klathmon 10y ago
I've had them curse and scream at me for wasting their time. One time after a few minutes on a call he asked me what I saw on the screen and I just said "My wallpaper, with the word Ubuntu across the back" and he started shouting "fucking kill yourself" and hung up!
- ceejayoz 10y ago
  I'd love to do this, but they have my phone number. I really don't want to have to get a new one if they get pissed enough to make it unusable.
  - ikeboy 10y ago
    They have little incentive to bother you once it's clear you aren't falling for it. The more of their time you waste, the more likely you'll get to some permanent blacklist which is good.
    - jeena 10y ago
      You would think so, and that was what I was trying to do, to get on some black list, but less then a week later they called me again, this time a woman called, but I didn't have the time to redo the whole thing again.
      - ikeboy 10y ago
        They might not put you on a blacklist, but they definitely won't single you out to waste more of their own time. Also, it might be a different company, I imagine competition is fierce.
    - ceejayoz 10y ago
      The company's not going to bother me, but it just takes one stalkery-minded person to start a personal vendetta. As someone with a unique name and a variety of Googlable data, I try to be fairly careful about who I piss off.
      - sqeaky 10y ago
        Let him have his vendetta. What is someone in India who is so poor he needs to work on the phones for one of these scammers going to do? It would take quite a while to save up for a plane ticket, and they would be risking their job if they abused their access to the phone system. If they somehow do own that scam business, then anything they do risks their profit margin.
        ceejayoz 10y ago
        Really not hard to imagine how someone half the world away could make life miserable for someone - SWATting, bomb threats to kids' schools, harassing phone calls. All already happen regularly.
  - nommm-nommm 10y ago
    Tell them you aren't at the computer right now so you need a number to call them back on. Call them back from a burner phone/Skype.
  - user_rob 10y ago
    You can use last number barring to block their calls. My best attempt at wasting their time was 28 minutes - normally would not bother but I was ill and needed something to distract me.
    - ceejayoz 10y ago
      They spoof caller ID data. I rarely if ever receive a same-number spam call. If they wanted to make my phone number unusable, they could.
      - neeleshs 10y ago
        Android nowadays marks calls as "suspected spam", worked great. In general, if it's important enough, the caller leaves a message. Otherwise, it's not important and I don't care about it.
        ceejayoz 10y ago
        That's great, and iOS now has a similar feature. It has zero effectiveness if someone decides to send a hundred thousand spoofed VoIP calls at you because you lost them their spammer/malware job by stringing them along.
        quicklyfrozen 10y ago
        There's no way for them to do that for free -- VoIP calls to PSTN still cost money.
- ssharp 10y ago
  I've only answered the phone once with these scammers. I told them I was using a Mac and after confirming three times that it was a Mac, he said "you're a liar!" and hung up.
  - pawadu 10y ago
    Just between you and me, off the record, no questions ask, no purchase required whatsoever... Were you really using a mac?
    - ssharp 10y ago
      It's half true. I have a Mac laptop and Windows desktop.
- M_Grey 10y ago
  Same here... it was my cue to laugh and hang up.
pwython 10y ago
> "How is this possible ...? Why are you waisting my time??" That's actually not so bad. I got a different, more hilarious response when a scammer realized I was stringing him along. Which I recorded. I received a call just last Thursday from a professionally recorded American sounding female voice saying it was my credit card company. "Nothing was wrong with my account" but there was an opportunity to reduce my interest rate on EITHER my "MasterCard" OR "Visa." I knew this was going to be fun so I played along, pressed 1, and got connected to a guy from India. He began by asking for my credit card number to verify my account. I started recording half way through, hoping to keep him on longer but failed. Here's the short clip from when he realized I was giving him random credit card numbers (NSFW language): https://instaud.io/Niz https://instaud.io/Niz
- chrisper 10y ago
  >I received a call just last Thursday from a professionally recorded American sounding female voice saying it was my credit card company. I get those too. Also ones that say they are from Mariott Hotel or something. They always use local phone numbers, so I always pick up :( But I hang up right away anyway.
  - rexf 10y ago
    Super annoying, I've been getting many of the Marriott calls from a local number (408) lately. Not sure what I can do besides not pick up unknown local calls.
- amyjess 10y ago
  > I received a call just last Thursday from a professionally recorded American sounding female voice saying it was my credit card company. "Nothing was wrong with my account" but there was an opportunity to reduce my interest rate on EITHER my "MasterCard" OR "Visa." I've gotten phone calls where the recording introduced itself with "Hi, this is the credit card holder rewards center for Visa Mastercard." Can they be any more obvious they're a scam? And then there's the generic "Hello, this is Rachel from Cardmember Services". Or "Cardholder Services" or whatever name they're using at the moment (it keeps changing names as the feds keep going after them).
giis 10y ago
Few months back, I posted this https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ri8TN2sHcM4&t=0s https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ri8TN2sHcM4&t=0s here and it got flagged. Your approach is similar to this guy :)
thisisandyok 10y ago
That's awesome. It does make me wonder though, do the people working in the call centers realize that they're scamming people or do they think it's a legitimate business?
- Naritai 10y ago
  I would guess (and I'm trying not to make any value judgement on this) that they view it as a job, and the sales commissions help pay for their lives and their family, and they don't think about it much more deeply than that. I recently read some comments from a Timeshare salesman in the US, whose attitude was similar. Asked "don't you feel bad that your job is basically to operate a large-scale real estate scam", he replied, (I paraphrase) "hey, at the end of the presentation, you have the contract right there in front of you, and if you choose to sign it, it's on you. My job is just to convince you to sign, and if I do, I get a good commission."
  - TeMPOraL 10y ago
    > My job is just to convince you to sign The more I deal with sales&marketing people the more I think there are two different mindsets people have. One says that if you do the "convincing" part by saying anything but honest truth, you're scamming people. The other seems not to attach any moral significance to the situation.
    - Naritai 10y ago
      And that doesn't even get into the question of "is omission lying?" I'm going to guess the latter group doesn't think it is.
  - st3v3r 10y ago
    This is why I can't take any of the "personal responsibility" people seriously. This salesman is not taking any responsibility for their actions.
    - Naritai 10y ago
aedron 10y ago
The easiest way to waste these guys time is to just tell them "OK, just hang on one second, be right with you", then put the phone down and leave them there waiting.
- GordonS 10y ago
  I did this recently, while leaving the phone next to speakers playing an annoying, high pitched sound I found on YouTube - surprisingly he stayed on for just over 10 minutes!
MichaelApproved 10y ago
There's a guy who setup a call capture bot with several soundbites of an old man ready to reply to call center scam calls. It's pretty funny to hear how well random stories and comments from a confused sounding older man does to keep them on the phone. https://www.reddit.com/r/itslenny/ https://www.reddit.com/r/itslenny/
- verelo 10y ago
  Wow, this is amazing. Thanks for sharing.

by jeena 10y ago

Klathmon 10y ago

I've had them curse and scream at me for wasting their time. One time after a few minutes on a call he asked me what I saw on the screen and I just said "My wallpaper, with the word Ubuntu across the back" and he started shouting "fucking kill yourself" and hung up!

ceejayoz 10y ago
I'd love to do this, but they have my phone number. I really don't want to have to get a new one if they get pissed enough to make it unusable.
- ikeboy 10y ago
  They have little incentive to bother you once it's clear you aren't falling for it. The more of their time you waste, the more likely you'll get to some permanent blacklist which is good.
  - jeena 10y ago
    You would think so, and that was what I was trying to do, to get on some black list, but less then a week later they called me again, this time a woman called, but I didn't have the time to redo the whole thing again.
    - ikeboy 10y ago
      They might not put you on a blacklist, but they definitely won't single you out to waste more of their own time. Also, it might be a different company, I imagine competition is fierce.
  - ceejayoz 10y ago
    The company's not going to bother me, but it just takes one stalkery-minded person to start a personal vendetta. As someone with a unique name and a variety of Googlable data, I try to be fairly careful about who I piss off.
    - sqeaky 10y ago
      Let him have his vendetta. What is someone in India who is so poor he needs to work on the phones for one of these scammers going to do? It would take quite a while to save up for a plane ticket, and they would be risking their job if they abused their access to the phone system. If they somehow do own that scam business, then anything they do risks their profit margin.
      - ceejayoz 10y ago
        Really not hard to imagine how someone half the world away could make life miserable for someone - SWATting, bomb threats to kids' schools, harassing phone calls. All already happen regularly.
- nommm-nommm 10y ago
  Tell them you aren't at the computer right now so you need a number to call them back on. Call them back from a burner phone/Skype.
- user_rob 10y ago
  You can use last number barring to block their calls. My best attempt at wasting their time was 28 minutes - normally would not bother but I was ill and needed something to distract me.
  - ceejayoz 10y ago
    They spoof caller ID data. I rarely if ever receive a same-number spam call. If they wanted to make my phone number unusable, they could.
    - neeleshs 10y ago
      Android nowadays marks calls as "suspected spam", worked great. In general, if it's important enough, the caller leaves a message. Otherwise, it's not important and I don't care about it.
      - ceejayoz 10y ago
        That's great, and iOS now has a similar feature. It has zero effectiveness if someone decides to send a hundred thousand spoofed VoIP calls at you because you lost them their spammer/malware job by stringing them along.
        quicklyfrozen 10y ago
        There's no way for them to do that for free -- VoIP calls to PSTN still cost money.
ssharp 10y ago
I've only answered the phone once with these scammers. I told them I was using a Mac and after confirming three times that it was a Mac, he said "you're a liar!" and hung up.
- pawadu 10y ago
  Just between you and me, off the record, no questions ask, no purchase required whatsoever... Were you really using a mac?
  - ssharp 10y ago
    It's half true. I have a Mac laptop and Windows desktop.
M_Grey 10y ago
Same here... it was my cue to laugh and hang up.

pwython 10y ago

> "How is this possible ...? Why are you waisting my time??" That's actually not so bad. I got a different, more hilarious response when a scammer realized I was stringing him along. Which I recorded. I received a call just last Thursday from a professionally recorded American sounding female voice saying it was my credit card company. "Nothing was wrong with my account" but there was an opportunity to reduce my interest rate on EITHER my "MasterCard" OR "Visa." I knew this was going to be fun so I played along, pressed 1, and got connected to a guy from India. He began by asking for my credit card number to verify my account. I started recording half way through, hoping to keep him on longer but failed. Here's the short clip from when he realized I was giving him random credit card numbers (NSFW language): https://instaud.io/Niz https://instaud.io/Niz

chrisper 10y ago
>I received a call just last Thursday from a professionally recorded American sounding female voice saying it was my credit card company. I get those too. Also ones that say they are from Mariott Hotel or something. They always use local phone numbers, so I always pick up :( But I hang up right away anyway.
- rexf 10y ago
  Super annoying, I've been getting many of the Marriott calls from a local number (408) lately. Not sure what I can do besides not pick up unknown local calls.
amyjess 10y ago
> I received a call just last Thursday from a professionally recorded American sounding female voice saying it was my credit card company. "Nothing was wrong with my account" but there was an opportunity to reduce my interest rate on EITHER my "MasterCard" OR "Visa." I've gotten phone calls where the recording introduced itself with "Hi, this is the credit card holder rewards center for Visa Mastercard." Can they be any more obvious they're a scam? And then there's the generic "Hello, this is Rachel from Cardmember Services". Or "Cardholder Services" or whatever name they're using at the moment (it keeps changing names as the feds keep going after them).

giis 10y ago

Few months back, I posted this https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ri8TN2sHcM4&t=0s https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ri8TN2sHcM4&t=0s here and it got flagged. Your approach is similar to this guy :)

thisisandyok 10y ago

That's awesome. It does make me wonder though, do the people working in the call centers realize that they're scamming people or do they think it's a legitimate business?

Naritai 10y ago
I would guess (and I'm trying not to make any value judgement on this) that they view it as a job, and the sales commissions help pay for their lives and their family, and they don't think about it much more deeply than that. I recently read some comments from a Timeshare salesman in the US, whose attitude was similar. Asked "don't you feel bad that your job is basically to operate a large-scale real estate scam", he replied, (I paraphrase) "hey, at the end of the presentation, you have the contract right there in front of you, and if you choose to sign it, it's on you. My job is just to convince you to sign, and if I do, I get a good commission."
- TeMPOraL 10y ago
  > My job is just to convince you to sign The more I deal with sales&marketing people the more I think there are two different mindsets people have. One says that if you do the "convincing" part by saying anything but honest truth, you're scamming people. The other seems not to attach any moral significance to the situation.
  - Naritai 10y ago
    And that doesn't even get into the question of "is omission lying?" I'm going to guess the latter group doesn't think it is.
- st3v3r 10y ago
  This is why I can't take any of the "personal responsibility" people seriously. This salesman is not taking any responsibility for their actions.
  - Naritai 10y ago

aedron 10y ago

The easiest way to waste these guys time is to just tell them "OK, just hang on one second, be right with you", then put the phone down and leave them there waiting.

GordonS 10y ago
I did this recently, while leaving the phone next to speakers playing an annoying, high pitched sound I found on YouTube - surprisingly he stayed on for just over 10 minutes!

MichaelApproved 10y ago

There's a guy who setup a call capture bot with several soundbites of an old man ready to reply to call center scam calls. It's pretty funny to hear how well random stories and comments from a confused sounding older man does to keep them on the phone. https://www.reddit.com/r/itslenny/ https://www.reddit.com/r/itslenny/

verelo 10y ago
Wow, this is amazing. Thanks for sharing.