part0016

It was a beautiful spring day in London. The sun beamed in through the balcony window, illuminating the bright white UPVC frames which skirted a perfect shot of the Thames Clipper quietly skating along the river. It was mid-afternoon on a hectic Tuesday, I’d been working from home and stood to admire the view as I took a short break and a late coffee to give me that last caffeine hit in the drive towards the end of the day.

After a couple of minutes, my Blackberry started buzzing (this was 2010) with ‘Unknown number’ displayed on the screen. I contemplated letting it go to voicemail thinking that they’d leave a message if it was important, but changed my mind and answered it just before it rang out. “Hello Jon speaking” I said in my most officious voice, just in case it was work related. The voice at the other end requested to speak to Mr White and when I confirmed it was me, they introduced themselves as calling from Microsoft Tech Support. My afternoon was about to get pretty interesting.

The supposed reason for the call turned out to be that my computer was infected with a virus or viruses and may have been running slowly as a result. Was this good customer care? How would they know this? To prove that this was a legitimate call, the voice on the other end of the line asked me the access the Microsoft Event Viewer on my laptop, which logs all Microsoft errors. They asked me to review the red crosses that indicate errors and asked if some were present. I confirmed that they were and the affable guy on the other end of the phone confirmed that this meant my computer was infected – a worrying reveal. However, he reassured me that I needn’t worry, as he was from Microsoft Tech Support and could help me rid my laptop of the viruses and get it running normally again. He asked me to open my browser and visit a website address that he read out, I assumed when I reached this website that I’d need to enter some personal details or maybe even some payment information. But we didn’t get that far.

You see, much as I wasn’t particularly security conscious in 2010, there was something not right about this call. So while I was happily chatting with the friendly voice on the phone and reviewing the error messages in Windows, I was also Googling the steps I was being asked to take to confirm what I suspected. When he asked me to open my browser, I responded “actually I don’t think I’m going to do that as I’ve just Googled what you’re asking me to do and apparently, it’s a scam.” Silence…. Dial tone… Needless to say the caller was nothing to do with Microsoft at all.

This is a cautionary tale about a scam that I first encountered in 2010 which is still in operation today. That’s an important and unnerving consideration, as the criminals that run this scam would not still being doing so after this amount of time, unless they were making money from it. It is very easy to fall for a scam of this nature, as the criminals rely on putting you on the spot and attempting to force you into making quick decisions at the instruction of someone who seems to know what they’re talking about. They rely on the fact that the vast majority of us, me included, are not IT experts, and for many of these potential victims, this call will be the first time they have ever seen the Windows Event Viewer on their laptop and they will not know that these errors are perfectly normal and mean absolutely nothing.

However, it’s the creation of a sense of urgency and panic that will force many of us into complying. When you step back and think about it, the sheer volume of Windows PCs in existence would render it impossible for any company to monitor every one for these errors and there is also no way that Microsoft could access these logs on the hard drive of your laptop (certainly without your express permission). It may be easy to say that in hindsight, but another thing to consider is that a tech support team will likely never proactively call you unless you’ve contacted them first with an issue.

Our contact information today is often so easily obtainable online, that it doesn’t matter if you have an unlisted number or if you are very careful about the information you put out there, you could still receive a call like this. While this was the first time I had been directly targeted by a phone scam of this nature, it was certainly not the last.

A couple of years ago I received a call from a man in an overseas call centre claiming he was from BT. He explained to me that my internet service would be shut-off tomorrow as it had been hacked and I needed to take action now. I was now much wiser to this kind of call and didn’t let it get much further. I refused to give him any information and instead asked questions of him. This is an important point, if someone calls you from a service provider that you use, they should be able to tell you some key information about your service. In this instance, I asked him to confirm to me what package I was subscribed to as he would have this information if he worked for BT. He quickly hung up on me.

The key thing about both of these incidents, which is a common feature of telephone scams, is that it plays on fear -the fear that your personal information, photos, bank details, etc. are at risk from criminals. This fear is compounded by the fact that those that you are supposedly under threat from are an unknown and unseen entity and those telling you about this threat are posing as representatives of an organisation you trust. I’m no behavioural psychologist, but I would suggest that it is this combination which creates the sense of urgency and panic which in turn makes us give in to the whims of these criminals, when, in other circumstances given time to think, we may not.

However, it is not just a friendly voice at the end of the phone which we need to be wary of, or indeed the suggestions of viruses or hackers. Some scams play on the fact that the majority of us don’t want to fall foul of the law and use recorded messages to deliver their missive to unsuspecting recipients. This requires even less work for the criminals, meaning their return on investment can improve further, even if only one in one thousand people targeted complies with their nefarious wishes.

The particular example I’m thinking of comes via a recorded message purporting to be from HMRC (Her Majesty’s Revenue and Customs, for those readers not in the UK). Earlier this year in the middle of a working day, I received a call from a number I did not recognise. The recorded message stated that I was the subject of a tax fraud investigation and needed to speak to HMRC immediately. It went on to say that I should press ‘1’ now to be put through to an advisor and if I didn’t do so, the case would be referred to the Police. Having been self-employed at one time and relatively familiar with HMRC’s online tax tools, I knew that this was bogus and hung up. But there was something in the back of my brain in the heat of the moment that was unsure. However, I expelled that doubt very quickly and even checked HMRC’s website about scam calls just to be 100 percent sure.

I’m not telling you these stories to pat myself on the back – I’ve been lucky in some cases and not so lucky in others. I’m sharing these tales to demonstrate that in the case of most scams, you need to take the time to check what you’re being asked to do – most of the time a quick internet search will tell you if the request is bogus. In fact, often the best way to combat the scammers is to take your time and not allow yourself to be rushed. Then there is less chance that you will allow yourself to give in to the illegitimate sense of fear that they create. Steps I’d suggest to remember are:

At this point, you may be thinking – why have I received so many scam calls? Well I’ve had the same mobile phone number for around 20 years, I have signed up to probably hundreds of online and offline services with it and the more you phone number is provided to companies, the more likely it is to be sold or obtained by any number of entities, including marketers and of course criminals.

Whoever has your mobile number, you must remember that on its own, it’s not particularly dangerous (otherwise small business owners would not put their contact details on their website). However, it is a gateway for criminals to target you and by keeping the steps above in mind, you should be able to ensure that you don’t fall prey to the numerous phone scams that are in operation today.