This is de support department of Microsoft Windows

[Tim OConnell]

Had another one of these Mumbai, or Hyderabad scammers calling today. Please read the dialogue, while simulating the appropriate head nod.

ring ring.... (phone shows caller blocked)
Me: " Hello who's speaking"
Mr. Mumbai Windows : "Hello. Dis is Microsoft Windows Support Department. Are you having a good day?" Bobble
Me: "I am about to" (devious chuckle)
Mr. Mumbai Windows: Bobble "We are seeing you have a problem with your windows computer"
Me: " What kind of problem?"
Mr. Mumbai Windows: "Your computer is transmitting red and yellow warnings"
Me: " Wow that sounds serious !! What does it mean?" (stifling a rip roaring laugh)
Mr. Mumbai Windows: "It means .. bobble.. that some crooked person is having access to your computer"
Me: " You mean like these people that pretend to be remote support for Microsoft?"
Mr. Mumbai Windows: "yes there are... no no... bobble....do you mean us?"
Me: " No of course not. That was just an example. What do you want me to do?"
Mr. Mumbai Windows: " if you give me your email address, I will email a message that shows you how to connect to our support department"
Me: " And what does the link do?"
Mr Mumbai Windows: " We will install a diagnostic software program to analyze your Windows computer" sounding happy and helpful
Me: " Well Mr. Windows Support Department, I have a suspicion you are a bunch of crooks and hackers. My Windows Computer as you put it, is turned off and I am 100% an Apple user" (lying through my teeth)
Mr. Mumbai Windows: ....click...... and hangs up.



There's a funny side to playing this game, but the serious aspect is that they must be fooling enough ignorant people to be getting access to PC's and stealing identity data for financial gain.

What gets up my nose is that the telephone companies CAN trace calls like this if they want to provide a service to legitimate customers of theirs. All connections, either circuit switched or packet switched, contain information about the origin and destination. If they didn't how would they know who to bill back for connections, apply the right destination tariff by length of call etc.... There's simply no will to do it and cut out the BS.

[LarryHoward]

Tim

You are much more patient than I am. I've gotten that call a couple of times and wish I were witty and patient so that I could at least waste their time. Instead, I usually unload on them with focused invective concerning their parentage and ethics.

[Ish]

Tim

You are much more patient than I am. I've gotten that call a couple of times and wish I were witty and patient so that I could at least waste their time. Instead, I usually unload on them with focused invective concerning their parentage and ethics.

"Bite me" and hang up is the extent of my courtesy.

[Tucky]

Nice job. One of my prouder moments was getting a cold calling stock broker to hang up on me. I mentioned that if he had real good stocks to offer he would be buying them himself instead of selling them to me. When he came back just a little snippy I started to ask him politely if anger worked as a selling technique, etc. Kept it up for a few minutes until he slammed the phone down.

The movie "Boiler Room" has a great scene when the salesman for one of the NYC papers calls the boiler room trainee. It also has other great scenes, of course set in New Jersey.

[Ish]

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-7OgWcwgB50[/youtube]

[Soñadora]

L
O
LL

[floating dutchman]

I had one of those windows helpers on the phone ofr about 40 minutes one day, no amount of telling him he was a scamer and abusing ans swearing would make him hang up, I even told him I was only tieing up his time so that he couldn't be scaming some little old lady.
In the end he hung up when I told him the earpiece on my phone was going brown from the shit coming out his mouth.
never did tell him I use Ubuntu.