Tech Support Scams Continue to Evolve

Tech Support scams are continuing to become a very popular attack method for cyber criminals all over the world. We’ve covered them pretty extensively on this blog in the past but when they come close to home with a little new style we always like to share. The scammers came after one of our employees with a new tactic this week. Normally tech support scammers will get you with a cold call that your computer is infected and hope they can trick you, or they will use malicious webpages that show alerts or play sirens that you have a virus and need to call the tech support number on screen. PC Matic has implemented protections to keep our users safe while browsing from these infinite alert loops.

Here’s The Twist

In a little change of style, the tech support scammers called a PC Pitstop employee and left a voicemail that their credit card had already been charged and in order to get a refund you had to call them. Now, this is a red flag right away but our employee decided to call the number and sure enough the scammers said in order to get a refund he needed to allow them access to his computer. The tactic switches up the scam a little bit in hopes of worrying people that they were suddenly charged $700, but don’t fall for it!

You can read or listen to the full transcript of the voicemail message below –

” … credit card has been charged for $699.99 for one years PC tech support. If you want to cancel our services please call us at 888-815-6011 immediately.”

Scammers are always out to try and trick us into giving them some of our cash. Remember to stay vigilant and learn about the scams that are out there. All PC Matic users have access to the KnowBe4 Security Awareness training for FREE with their PC Matic license. If you or someone in your family hasn’t taken the training and would like to, please contact our support team for details on how to access it at: www.pcmatic.com/help.

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Prevent Them.

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