A new WINDOWS scam?

[XRSEX]

Had a customer of mine fall for this :(

I fixed it up for him, 55 registry infections and some not so nice auto installers.

[Interceptor]

Originally Posted by JazManXII

if anyone gets there email a simple macro can have you send them 1000's of emails and potentially shutting them down for awhile

did that to someone who was sending me 1mb files every day trying to get me to sign up as an investor..... replies didnt work, so i sent the file back..... several thousand times.....

after 2 days i recieved an email asking me to stop.....




i did...... eventually

[Interceptor]

btw, when they call at work i offer to help them, then when they start thier spiel i tell them the guy they need to talk to is out of the office atm, but they can reach him on his mobile.....

0419 317 446 (rejection hotline)

the classic part is how thankful they seem..... but oh how i wish i had a webcam in thier office to see the look on thier faces

[ch33z1l]

I had a client call me yesterday to say she had someone on the phone from sydney, informing her that her computer would crash in two hours (wow, very precise prediction). She was a few seconds away from clicking accept on a remote connection program.

Very sneaky!

[Pedro]

Some years ago I was getting these daily faxes from an office supply company offering all sorts of discounts on their stock. When they didn't stop sending them as requested, I typed P--- Off onto an A4 sheet and then taped this to two other sheets. I then inserted the first sheet into the fax machine and started it and when the leading edge came out I taped it to the end of the last sheet thereby making a continuous roll. I sent this after 5.00pm when I closed the office and left it going all night. Guess it stopped at their end when their machine ran out of paper. I didn't receive any more faxes from them.

[outside]

thats gold

[gtfpv]

the thing that gets me with all of this is how come there is so many smart people in 3rd world countries where computors are rare , scamming people all over the world . i would nt know how to do this if i tried , and neither would most aussies i would think .
i get emails with links everyday about employment oportunities , my email address always appears different , on these e'mails , SO HOW DOES IT GET TO MY INBOX ? i never click on the links, it always says i made X amount of $$ in 4 hours using my computor , click here , you will thank me . every freekin day.
they must've got my info from seek . the worry for me , is how come so many email addresses are coming to my email inbox . i only have one e'mail account , yet all these different versions of it appear onthe sent to blah blah blah , which isnt my emila address .

[fmc351]

Originally Posted by gtfpv

the thing that gets me with all of this is how come there is so many smart people in 3rd world countries where computors are rare , scamming people all over the world . i would nt know how to do this if i tried , and neither would most aussies i would think .
i get emails with links everyday about employment oportunities , my email address always appears different , on these e'mails , SO HOW DOES IT GET TO MY INBOX ? i never click on the links, it always says i made X amount of $$ in 4 hours using my computor , click here , you will thank me . every freekin day.
they must've got my info from seek . the worry for me , is how come so many email addresses are coming to my email inbox . i only have one e'mail account , yet all these different versions of it appear onthe sent to blah blah blah , which isnt my emila address .

They can get your info from many places, there are at least eleventy billion mailing lists out there from businesses collecting info at the cash register, and at least some of them are for sale. And worse, once its out there, it can be pirated too. But I would say its fairly easy for spammers to compile their own using software and common sense. It costs nothing to send emails, so someone could just send out thousands upon thousands to addresses that may or may not exist. Over time, they are sending to millions of email addresses. Yours happens to exist. Try sending an email to say "erolfljrkfl093274987@gmail.com". Or any email address that doesnt exist. You should get a message saying unable to send, or a delivery failure notice of some kind. That tells you the address probably doesnt exist. So, if there is no failure notice, chances are that address exists.

Id say it wouldnt be too hard for a tech savvy individual to write a script that randomly makes up combinations of letters and numbers and attaching them to various known webserver addresses. For example, @optusnet.com.au and @exetel.com.au and any other of the ISP's or webmail domain names. Domain names arent that hard to find. Using a database to store successful emails they can compile a known email address list. When many people do this across the planet and cover pretty much all webserver addresses, and assuming they can share the lists, a much larger list could exist. And so on. The software does it all, the spammer doesnt have to do much so its not a difficult process for them once they find a list of ISP's and webserver domain names. Its pretty much automated. You could also use variations of likely names from a phone book database, say a listing for "Anderson A" as aanderson, or a.anderson @ insert any known ISP domain.

Im no techy, but what I do understand leads me to think the above is probably very easy to do with the right knowhow.

[XB GS 351 Coupe]

Five ways to fix these callers, and I use all of them depending on how I feel on the day.

1) Simply not say a word and hang up.

2) Say you will be back in a second, put the phone down and leave it there till they hang up.

3) The old Seinfeld one, ask them for their name and home number and say you will call them back at home tonight while they have dinner, if they say they don't like people calling them at home or similar just reply same here and hang up.

4) Ask them in a suspicious voice how they got this secret number, as this number is only available to secret service personel, and that all callers will be traced and secret service agents will be dispatched to follow up on the caller (they usually hang up in a flash)

5) Pretend to not speak english, or pretend you can not understand them, or alteratively just start talking random crap to them that is not relevant to what they are talking about.

All fun to do...

[gtfpv]

i've always thought of , trying to start flirtatious conversation with them , which leads to . wat are you wearing . lol . That would be hilarious , but i dont have the hyde to do it . . i'd laugh my head off though . if someone done that .

[ch33z1l]

Originally Posted by Pedro

Some years ago I was getting these daily faxes from an office supply company offering all sorts of discounts on their stock. When they didn't stop sending them as requested, I typed P--- Off onto an A4 sheet and then taped this to two other sheets. I then inserted the first sheet into the fax machine and started it and when the leading edge came out I taped it to the end of the last sheet thereby making a continuous roll. I sent this after 5.00pm when I closed the office and left it going all night. Guess it stopped at their end when their machine ran out of paper. I didn't receive any more faxes from them.

You used to be able to use black paper, and it would empty the receiving fax's toner as well.

[jamesson1980]

My sister's boyfriend makes a fortune doing his job. God bless him, he sits there all day in an office bartering with the likes of Telco's / Insurance / Banks etc for peoples home phone numbers. He makes offers for 'lists' of personal contacts which the companies always readily accept. Someone else then compiles the 'lists' into more specific lists based on where he bought them from, what suburb they lay in and a few other factors, to eventually tailor 'lists' to suit specific telemarketers 'targets'. Different lists are different prices, and the telemarketers buy the lists from his company to suit their own needs. He is adamant that they never sell to scammers, but being an industry of such low moral standard, it would hardly surprise me if some big shot at the company did.

He's not proud of his work, but for his wage, I think many would find it tempting. He once gave me a tip for telemarketers/scammers which is foolproof. Simply lower your voice and say 'this number is on the no-not-call register, how did you get it?' The operator apologises and hangs and reports a 'dud' number.. this filters right back thru the whole chain, right up to whoever sold the number in the first place eg Telstra. Regardless of whether the number is on the register of not, they treat it with the utmost seriousness and wanna get to the origin of the useless and potentially damaging number.

It works, every time, they won't risk arguing with you, they will take your word and leave you alone because it's serious privacy business this 'do not call register'.. alternatively, put your number on the register yourself, it's free and takes 30 seconds online
https://www.donotcall.gov.au/

[jamesson1980]

.. although this defeats the entertainment some of the above members have been having with telemarketers

[Pedro]

Originally Posted by ch33z1l

You used to be able to use black paper, and it would empty the receiving fax's toner as well.

You're right ... wish I'd thought of that.