Odd phone call - computer maintance

[Furiously]

So I get a phone call on my cel phone and pick up, and say hello three times then the phone rings, which gets me real annoyed cause I know it's an auto-dialer and a call from a call center.

Nice Indian man named "Steve" on the other end lets me know, my computer has a problem, and that I need to visit their website to fix it, and how it will only take 10 minutes.

Anyone else gotten this?

[Hawkbit]

Sounds legit to me. 

[Signe]

I'm sure you're much to busy for that sort of thing.  Just give him your CC info and let him sort it out.  My latest was someone calling to ask me to choose the courses for the online degree I signed up for.  He had my name (or some mumbled variation of it) and my email address and kept insisting I signed up for online courses.  I had to hang up on him.  On a interesting note - something I hadn't noticed before - I can get that caller ID on FIOS TV.  So if I'm watching TV and someone calls, I'll know if it's a spammer and won't have get up and look for the phone.  Like right  now - I have no idea where it is!  Anyway, there is becoming less and less reason for people to have legs!

[Merusk]

I have an unlisted number and I'm on the national DNC list.   I don't get calls from folks I don't know.

[Signe]

I also have an unlisted number and on the national DNC list.  Neither of them seem to work all that well.

[Musashi]

I have an unlisted number and I'm on the national DNC list.   I don't get calls from folks I don't know.

You lie!

[Signe]

No, I really don't lie.  We even signed up to local DNRs and still get spam.  I opt out of almost everything, too.

[Musashi]

No he lies!

[Merusk]

Nope, no calls.  We're also in a lesser metro area and have had our number unlisted for 7 years, though, so I'm sure that helps.

Phone numbers are more recycled than license plate numbers, so if you're in a bigger metro area chances are someone knows it and has sold it many times over.  We got 3 calls from an elderly woman looking for "Margaret" the first two years we were here, so I'm guessing we got a number that wasn't used much before we got it as well.

Anywho, sounds like a nice new scam someone's got going.  I wonder how legal it really is.

[KallDrexx]

I've been getting random automatic messages in spanish on my cell phone lately O.o

3rd one in a month last night.

[penfold]

My mum had something similar, a bloke saying he was from Microsoft and wanted her to go to a website to fix a virus. When she said she would speak to her son first he actually got irate.

[Signe]

No he lies!

Oh right.  Sorry.  Yes, he's always telling us fibs.  I don't even believe that Merusk is his name!  Also, I've never had a listed number in all my life.  My parents did, but not me.  Not once.  Righ even gets some of the same calls on his business phone.  It's just strange.

[Jherad]

So I get a phone call on my cel phone and pick up, and say hello three times then the phone rings, which gets me real annoyed cause I know it's an auto-dialer and a call from a call center.

Nice Indian man named "Steve" on the other end lets me know, my computer has a problem, and that I need to visit their website to fix it, and how it will only take 10 minutes.

Anyone else gotten this?

Had exactly the same thing a couple of times back in February/March in the UK before I moved to the US. He knew my name, but didn't offer any further info - I told him to 'go away'. Thought briefly about following along with him on a VM, but couldn't be arsed.

[tar]

Yeah I've had something similar, except the guy claimed to be from Microsoft Had a short conversation which consisted of me politely telling him I didn't believe him, "You don't believe I'm from microsoft?", "Nope" *click*

[Murgos]

For a while I got calls claiming that my warranty on my car was ending and if I wanted to extend it?  When I asked them what make and model of car the warranty was expiring on or how much longer I had on my that warranty they had no clue and tried to get me to tell them.

Lots of scams out there.

[Stormwaltz]

For a while I got calls claiming that my warranty on my car was ending and if I wanted to extend it?  When I asked them what make and model of car the warranty was expiring on or how much longer I had on my that warranty they had no clue and tried to get me to tell them.

That one was popular in Edmonton last spring.

[Minvaren]

For a while I got calls claiming that my warranty on my car was ending and if I wanted to extend it?  When I asked them what make and model of car the warranty was expiring on or how much longer I had on my that warranty they had no clue and tried to get me to tell them.

That one was popular in Edmonton last spring.

IIRC they ended up getting a US Senator's cell phone # (on the do-not-call registry) into their wardialing campaign.  And what do you know, something that had been ignored for years got shut down quickly.

[Ingmar]

My mum had something similar, a bloke saying he was from Microsoft and wanted her to go to a website to fix a virus. When she said she would speak to her son first he actually got irate.

Same exact thing happened to my mom, the guy on the phone actually yelled at her when she wouldn't cooperate.

[Furiously]

I wish I had a machine I would have been comfortable visiting their site with, I can't imagine how much stuff infects you visiting them. Forcing you to get their product to clean your computer.

[Morat20]

Nope, no calls.  We're also in a lesser metro area and have had our number unlisted for 7 years, though, so I'm sure that helps.

Phone numbers are more recycled than license plate numbers, so if you're in a bigger metro area chances are someone knows it and has sold it many times over.  We got 3 calls from an elderly woman looking for "Margaret" the first two years we were here, so I'm guessing we got a number that wasn't used much before we got it as well.

Anywho, sounds like a nice new scam someone's got going.  I wonder how legal it really is.

Debt collectors like to call anyone in the neighborhood of whomever's last address, call anyone in the same area with the same last name, and will repeatedly call the last address even years later and despite being told, for years, no one by that name lives there.

I get at least one or two calls a month looking for the same exact two names -- one of which who has never lived here, and the other who lived here for three months 10 years ago. Interestingly enough, the folks trying to collect on a debt of my wife's apparently FINALLY shit-canned it (rather than selling it) after I threatened legal action and quoted both Texas and Federal law on debt collections. They were trying to collect a disputed debt 5 years after the law allows, and hinting very  heavily at legal action to recover it.

[Khaldun]

The warranty call was a fascinating example, yeah. Tons of people got it on cellphones, it was reported thousands of times to the FTC's Do Not Call webpage, and the FTC sat on its ass "needing more information". Then as noted, a Senator got the call and got on the phone to the FTC. They suddenly discovered that they had enough information and swung into action. They found all of the people running the call quickly and put them out of business.

Now there's another wave of robocalls going out to cellphones. I've gotten hit with four from the Nebraska area code in two days. Did a search on the number and surprise surprise, there's hundreds of reports of calls from one of three or four Nebraska numbers. FTC has reports of it. But I'm guessing that for some reason, "they don't have enough information".

[Signe]

I've had people call for whoever had this number last quite a lot and we've had this number for years!  I've never had anyone call because someone lived in this house.  That's just nuts.  It's easy enough to look up and find that the property has changed ownership.  The people probably didn't even have that phone number.  If they can go through the trouble of finding a number for a house in which someone who owes them money lived in, why can't they figure out it's not the person they're looking for?  It wonder if they're actually sometimes successful in getting people to pay other people's bills just to shut them up?

[Rasix]

Haven't got anything like this yet, but I'm afraid I'll have to warn the rest of my family. They're particularly gullible and ill informed when it comes to computers.  They're the types that regularly mix up RAM and hard drive space when talking about computers.   

I got an interesting call about a week ago.  Apparently it was a police officer in Phoenix looking for a previous tennant of my home due to documents uncovered during an identity fraud bust.  Quite possible it was just an ID thief looking for some information but it's not like I kept in touch with the previous owners.  He gave phone numbers to confirm his story, but I still left that call feeling that something wasn't quite right.

[Morat20]

Haven't got anything like this yet, but I'm afraid I'll have to warn the rest of my family. They're particularly gullible and ill informed when it comes to computers.  They're the types that regularly mix up RAM and hard drive space when talking about computers.   

I got an interesting call about a week ago.  Apparently it was a police officer in Phoenix looking for a previous tennant of my home due to documents uncovered during an identity fraud bust.  Quite possible it was just an ID thief looking for some information but it's not like I kept in touch with the previous owners.  He gave phone numbers to confirm his story, but I still left that call feeling that something wasn't quite right.

I've had at least two calls from "Visa security" that came from suspicious looking phone numbers. The ones that go "This is Visa/Mastercard security wanting to inquire about some suspicious purchases" and then list a number of purchases from various locations (and their prices) and just want to know "Did you spend that or did someone take your card?" I have no problem with. The ones that ask to verify certain information, and don't give me anything to indicate they're legit.....

Well, I make it a habit to tell them "I will contact the security line listed on my card and discuss it that way". I still don't know if those were legit calls or not -- my debit card's a Visa, and they had a rather weird privacy policy for awhile where they wouldn't give ME information to prove they were legit until I gave them information, lest they give out private information to someone random person answering my phone. I think they finally changed it to no longer require anything but vocal "Yes, this is he" information if calling the numbers I have registered with them as my home and cell.

[Khaldun]

I've had people call for whoever had this number last quite a lot and we've had this number for years!  I've never had anyone call because someone lived in this house.  That's just nuts.  It's easy enough to look up and find that the property has changed ownership.  The people probably didn't even have that phone number.  If they can go through the trouble of finding a number for a house in which someone who owes them money lived in, why can't they figure out it's not the person they're looking for?  It wonder if they're actually sometimes successful in getting people to pay other people's bills just to shut them up?

People call us at home a lot looking for whoever had this number last. They also never seem to believe that the guy is not there and have a sort of hostile attitude, so my assumption is that he's got creditors or collection agencies looking for him. Then just last week, three years after we've had this number, we got a call on a Sunday morning where the caller ID showed it was that guy, who quickly said, "Wrong number" and hung up.  I toyed with calling him back and telling him to finally deal with the collection agencies/Mafiosos/whomever that wants to find him, but decided to leave it at that.

[Nerf]

While not quite a random telemarketer scam, I ran into a nice little gem a couple days ago.

One of my reps just signed up a restaurant for new credit card processing - his previous processor was *raping* him - 60-90k/mo volume and I was knocking $880 per month off his processing bill with pretty standard rates (His lowest rate was 2.8% or so iirc, with about half of his sales breaking 3.5%).  We finally get ready to install it and all of a sudden the POS company tells the customer "Oh, you can't switch processors, the current version of the software you are using isn't PCI compliant, if you want to switch companies you'll have to update to our newest version for $500.  Oh, by the way, your computer doesn't have enough RAM to handle the upgrade, and you have to buy that from us too."

Nevermind the fact that he's been out of compliance for as long as this company has been absolutely fucking his business, but the moment he wants to switch all of a sudden it starts getting very expensive.  Unfortunately for my rep, the owner is some crazy Indian guy who refuses to pay anything to switch, so it looks like he loses a sale and the customer continues to get fucked.

Credit card processing can be shady as fuck.  If theres an industry that needs to get it's dick slapped, it's this one.

[Cyrrex]

I get (or used to get?) the vehicle warranty cars all the time.  My wife always gets worried when I let the those calls go directly to the voicemail (You better hope our warranties aren't really about to expire!).  At least those seem somewhat plausible, given that I actually own automobiles.

The ones that get me are all the credit card and loan consolidation ones.  They are desperately trying to saving me from my terribly high interest rates and bail me out of the loans I seem to be defaulting on.  Trouble is, I have no loans of any kind, nor do I have a single credit card.   

[WayAbvPar]

I have a couple I can let you pay on if you feel left out of the American experience.

[Cyrrex]

Funny you say that, because it was living in Europe for a decade that completely cured me of the desire to have any kind of credit card.  They seem to have a much healthier view on such things, not surprisingly.

[Merusk]

I've had people call for whoever had this number last quite a lot and we've had this number for years!  I've never had anyone call because someone lived in this house.  That's just nuts.  It's easy enough to look up and find that the property has changed ownership.  The people probably didn't even have that phone number.  If they can go through the trouble of finding a number for a house in which someone who owes them money lived in, why can't they figure out it's not the person they're looking for?  It wonder if they're actually sometimes successful in getting people to pay other people's bills just to shut them up?

People call us at home a lot looking for whoever had this number last. They also never seem to believe that the guy is not there and have a sort of hostile attitude, so my assumption is that he's got creditors or collection agencies looking for him. Then just last week, three years after we've had this number, we got a call on a Sunday morning where the caller ID showed it was that guy, who quickly said, "Wrong number" and hung up.  I toyed with calling him back and telling him to finally deal with the collection agencies/Mafiosos/whomever that wants to find him, but decided to leave it at that.

Wrong move.  You should have written the number down and just given it to the next agency that calls.  I figure they'd all find out soon enough via the grapevine and leave you alone.   I had a similar problem at work, where I inherited my direct-dial extension from a real deadbeat.  I'd get 2-3 calls every few months explain I didn't know where he was, hadn't been there for 2+ years and no, I didn't have any further information but I could forward them on to H.R. if they wanted.  If I'd had the number to get in contact with him I sure as hell would have given it to them for the nuisance.

[Minvaren]

Wrong move.  You should have written the number down and just given it to the next agency that calls.  I figure they'd all find out soon enough via the grapevine and leave you alone.   I had a similar problem at work, where I inherited my direct-dial extension from a real deadbeat.  I'd get 2-3 calls every few months explain I didn't know where he was, hadn't been there for 2+ years and no, I didn't have any further information but I could forward them on to H.R. if they wanted.  If I'd had the number to get in contact with him I sure as hell would have given it to them for the nuisance.

Yes and no...

By contract, the collection agencies are supposed to forward updated (or suspected) contact information back to the party they are collecting for.  However, some third-party collection agencies will refuse to update phone numbers or addresses to their client on the basis that it would actually help the next agency that tries to collect.  On average, outsourced collections are done by "tiers" that are designated by time since the account was charged off (or sometimes before the debt gets charged off, but I digress).  Tier 1 and 2 agencies, the big ones especially, are notorious for this sort of game (and don't ask what sort of games the actual client's internal collection departments play - they're all but unregulated).

From my experience, the best way to get the phone number associated with that person to show up on most skip-tracing services is through a utility bill or their credit bureau report showing that number.  And nowadays, if a Google search of their name returns the right phone number...  But having enough information, one could likely apply for credit in their name and get the ball rolling too.  Presuming one was less-than-ethical and all.   

[brellium]

Wrong move.  You should have written the number down and just given it to the next agency that calls.  I figure they'd all find out soon enough via the grapevine and leave you alone.   I had a similar problem at work, where I inherited my direct-dial extension from a real deadbeat.  I'd get 2-3 calls every few months explain I didn't know where he was, hadn't been there for 2+ years and no, I didn't have any further information but I could forward them on to H.R. if they wanted.  If I'd had the number to get in contact with him I sure as hell would have given it to them for the nuisance.

Yes and no...

By contract, the collection agencies are supposed to forward updated (or suspected) contact information back to the party they are collecting for.  However, some third-party collection agencies will refuse to update phone numbers or addresses to their client on the basis that it would actually help the next agency that tries to collect.  On average, outsourced collections are done by "tiers" that are designated by time since the account was charged off (or sometimes before the debt gets charged off, but I digress).  Tier 1 and 2 agencies, the big ones especially, are notorious for this sort of game (and don't ask what sort of games the actual client's internal collection departments play - they're all but unregulated).

From my experience, the best way to get the phone number associated with that person to show up on most skip-tracing services is through a utility bill or their credit bureau report showing that number.  And nowadays, if a Google search of their name returns the right phone number...  But having enough information, one could likely apply for credit in their name and get the ball rolling too.  Presuming one was less-than-ethical and all.   

Credit reports don't have the phone number *unless* the person has placed it there usually in some form of a consumer alert.

The biggest way they show up is through pizza orders, those lists are usually sold in some way.

[Segoris]

So I get a phone call on my cel phone and pick up, and say hello three times then the phone rings, which gets me real annoyed cause I know it's an auto-dialer and a call from a call center.

Nice Indian man named "Steve" on the other end lets me know, my computer has a problem, and that I need to visit their website to fix it, and how it will only take 10 minutes.

Anyone else gotten this?

Was this by chance from a company named "kenoxis systems" or something? My mom just got a call from them and was gullible enough to go to their site and download their p2p client so the person on the other end of the line could have access due to the "kenoxis" person stating he was doing contract work for Microsoft. I'm told my dad only told her to hang up about a dozen times before he called me for assistance and to explain to her how and why this wasn't safe to her and to hang up. I guess the guy from kenoxis called about 4-5 more times while my dad used some choice words with him each time. Persistent bastard. Anyways, I got her to download Avast and ad-aware and am walking her through uninstalling the client.

Anyways, has anyone definitely heard of kenoxis? I'm wondering if I my mom's laptop is fucked and I should just do a format/reinstall this weekend or just trust in avast/ad-aware.

[Ingmar]

This may be of some help:

http://www.scam.com/showthread.php?t=119481

[Trippy]

I get (or used to get?) the vehicle warranty cars all the time.  My wife always gets worried when I let the those calls go directly to the voicemail (You better hope our warranties aren't really about to expire!).  At least those seem somewhat plausible, given that I actually own automobiles.

The FTC finally cracked down on those car warranty robodialers about a year ago.