Fraud Alert

[jake-the-peg]

Thought someone may benefit from this.

Had a call from a friend last night who had had a call from someone calling themselves something like microsoftsupportline.com

They told them that they had virus alerts from their computer and where there to help. They tricked him into letting them control their computer and it seemed to have a lot of viruses - they then asked for money.

He hung up - I investigated and found the rebsite was registerred - no surprise - in Africa

Scam is a bit like this

http://www.digitaltoa...ick-systemrecure-scam

Thing is coming up to Christmas if they can get a trojan onto lots of computers they will harvest lots of credit card details


IF YOU GET UNSOLICITED TECH SUPPORT CALLS HANG UP

[VHG]

This is becoming more and more common and has been reported on a number of forums.

I have had 3 calls like this myself.

Note if they had control of his computer they may well have stolen personal information as they will have had access to his hard disk. In fact they may still HAVE control of his computer.

NEVER let anybody take control of your computer, no matter who they say they are.

Dont give them ANY information, just tell them to f**k off and put the phone down.

[carlton23]

Yes, everybody should be aware of these tricksters at this and anytime of the year. Thanks Jake.

[milly143]

Never heard of this one before but it's quite shocking. I can imagine a lot of people being taken in by this and before they know it, someone has access to their whole life. Scary.

[Gromit]

My friend got this and they told him to follow certain steps and they were leading him to tell them his computer's IP Address. After a few minutes they said "Now open that window and read me what it says. Having not followed any of instructions he said its says "Mac OSX 10.6 Snow Leopard" . The fraudster was not amused

[jake-the-peg]

Macs are definately not immune from security vulnerabilities Grommit!

http://www.technewswo.../must-read/50287.html

Mac users are particularly vulnerble because they have tendency to sit back and smugly think they're immune

[ABerrant]

http://www.theanswerb...k/Question945613.html

[jake-the-peg]

Looks like it's becoming increasingly common ABerrant!

Scumbags winding up prior to Christmas.

[Davethedog]

Jake are you ex-directory or not? I take it ot was a fixed line?

[Gromit]

There are no viruses in the we for OSX. That is why if someone phoned and said they had detected a Virus on their computer, and they were running a Mac, they would instantly know it was a con. In my friends case, he strung along the the fraudster , who said there was a virus, but went through the processors for navigating to his IP number in Windoze. He kept him on the phone for ten minutes before revealing he was using a Mac.

As for Mac users being more vulnerable, that is pure tosh, the numbers speak for themselves.

[ChuckFickens]

"There are no viruses in the we for OSX"

That's pure tosh, there are viruses that target mac OSX. they might not be a plentiful as windows viruses but they certainly do exist.

[yogi-bear]

Hiya Chuck,

I have an Apple Powerbook G4 as one of my gizmo's, and to date, have never had viruses on it.....Is it true that Apple products are nigh on impossible to get them.?

[Gromit]

ChuckFickens

That should have read,

"There are no viruses in the wild for OSX. (there are theoretical ones in the lab, but non have been distributed and got into the Mac using community.)"

If you dispute that, I hope you can supply a reference to a Mac OSX virus that has taken hold (and please don't try and shift to malware or other vunerabilities).

[ChuckFickens]

http://www.f-secure.c...descs/inqtana_a.shtml

http://www.symantec.c...d=2006-021614-4006-99

[ChuckFickens]

also, given that the latest update for OSx had patches for well over 100 security vulnerabilities I think it's a little narrow minded to say macs do not get viruses, sure they are not targeted anywhere near as much as windows based computers, but the vulnerabilities are there and as there have been at least 2 reported mac viruses in the last few years I don't think giving the impression that macs are invulnerable to viruses is a good idea.

Incidentally, I use Linux at home on all my computers and I don't think Linux is impervious to viruses either, just like OSx, it's a lot lot more secure than windows, but you still have to be careful.

[boxtops]

This sounds the same as the one reported a few days ago, where someone rang up saying that they were from Microsoft and that they had noticed that the person's computer was running slow. They don't - they can't - they are scammers.

[jake-the-peg]

Gromit viruses are a form of malware - they are generall in decline compared to the flood of trojans out there.

Vulnerabilities are often used to install password and credit card stealing torjans so to exclude them is misleading

Safari has had a wealth of vulnerabilities
http://threatpost.com...erability-list-110909

Firefox was top with 44% followed by Safari on 35% in last years stats.

things like this
http://www.zdnet.com/...-backdoor-tool/251586

This is the Mac fake-alert
http://www.zdnet.com....us-tool-339285176.htm

I wasn't the target of this attack - I don't believe my friend was ex-directory but I've since heard of people being called who were.

But then victims details are often bought and sold

[Gromit]

Always the same. Say there are no Mac viruses and you get people saying there are dozens, then go on about trojans and malware which are totally different.

ChuckFickens

I said "There are no viruses in the wild for OSX. (there are theoretical ones in the lab, but non have been distributed and got into the Mac using community.)"

You reply with one built in a lab as a demo which has not got into the wild. From your own link: Inqtana.A is a Java based proof of concept bluetooth worm. It has not been met in the wild.