Watch out for this Netflix “tech support” scam

[Ohio Joe]

Jerome Segura has been tracking tech support scams for a year, documenting the ploys he's encountered. But even this one found him unprepared.

"Combining a phishing scam with a fake tech support call center is something that I'd never seen before," the Malwarebytes senior security researcher told Wired.co.uk. A video of the find shows Segura trying to enter a fake Netflix login on the streaming service's homepage, only to be presented with a notice telling him the account has been suspended, and telling him to call a fake tech support number.

He dutifully called up and was asked to download "Netflix Support Software"—really the remote control software TeamViewer, which allowed the scammer access to his system. Once he had hopped on, the hacker told Segura he'd been hacked. In fact, the scammer said he'd been hacked nine times, with one coming from Serbia, four from Russia, three from China, and one from Italy. It's all part of a tactic to instill fear and get the user to comply, explains Segura. Like when the helpful voice on the other end of the phone showed him a scan of apparent hacker activity—which was really just custom-made Windows batch script.

"By running their own tool, which looks authentic, the crooks can detect 'problems' that do not exist," says Segura. "Finally, showing those scan results adds to the fear factor, as well as creating a sense of urgency to fix the issue."

http://arstechnica.com/security/2014/03/watch-out-for-this-netflix-tech-support-scam/

[Tommy_Carcetti]

1. Did you try turning it off and back on again? nt

[hobbit709]

2. Anyone that falls for any of these scams deserves to get hacked.

A good hard look at their BS reveals itself every time.

[justhanginon]

3. No one "deserves" to get hacked!

There are a lot of us that are not as computer savvy as you obviously think you are.

[laundry_queen]

4. +1

I've always been a really gullible and trusting person. There are lots of reasons why, my therapist has explained it and it makes sense. Basically, I had a lot of emotional abuse and volatility in my environment growing up. Kids who are raised in an environment where they don't know if they are coming or going and are always walking on eggshells usually either become hard, cold and skeptical of everything and everyone, or they become overly trustworthy and let too many unsavory characters in their life. I'm the latter. There can be no middle ground in those circumstances because a child's brain isn't wired that way, according to my therapist. A child unconsciously chooses the strategy they think will most benefit their survival in that particular circumstance with their parents (Trust everyone and everything, or don't trust anyone ever) and their brain connections grow in that manner.

Anyway.

I had one of those stupid Microsoft calls where they tell you "we are looking at your computer from our tech centre and we can see you have a very serious virus". I was a bit confused, thinking, "they can do that? See me when I'm online? I'm so not comfortable with that!" then I asked, "which computer?"

See, I may be a single parent, but my kids are the only grandkids on both sides and the grandparents are well off. Everyone has a laptop in this house (I have one because I require one for school).

So when I asked which one, he said, "The one with Windows." I laughed and said, "We have 4 of those...which one? What's the admin name?" I figured if he could see my system, he'd know which one. Obviously he didn't know and he got very irate. By then I had figured it out. He started yelling so I hung up and called the gov't fraud hotline here in Canada.

If I was older, didn't know much about computers and only had 1 computer, I may well have been taken by the scam. I can see how people are. When I told other people about how I was called, everyone told me, "Oh, that's obviously a scam, why didn't you just hang up? I knew it was a scam right away blahblahblah" Well, not everyone has the ability to decipher those types of things. I'm getting better, but it doesn't come naturally to me. I usually trust people as a default. So, yeah, I agree with you. It's not that easy and just because I have this mental block, doesn't mean I 'deserve' to get scammed.

[bigwillq]

6. I fell for a scam once.

And I didn't deserve it.

I was having issues with my computer so I tried to "clean" it using this "software" I bought on-line. My virus protection had expired, so I thought this would be a good alternative.

Well, the "software" that kept popping up telling me I need to run a scan was a virus. I paid like $80 bucks for it, too.

Took forever to get the charge taken off of my credit card and an additional $120 to fix my computer.

[jberryhill]

5. People of low intelligence are there to be abused

After all, since 50% of the population, by definition, has below average intelligence, they should just bend over and take it all day long.