I’ve heard of this recently occurring in the U.K., but today I had a client tell me HE got a call a week ago from someone claiming to be from Microsoft.  The person had an accent that indicated he was probably calling from India.  This person said that a virus had been detected on his computer and they were going to help him remove it.  Fortunately he was smart enough to realize that Microsoft doesn’t KNOW his phone number, so he immediately was suspicious and didn’t give them any information.  They will try to get you to go to a web site to install software to “remove” the virus (it will in face INSTALL a virus), and may even try to get your credit card information to pay for certain services.

Please don’t fall for this.  This is just a phone scam and since most computer users run Windows, their chance is pretty good that the people they call will actually have a Windows computer.  Obviously homes that only have mac’s get a pretty good laugh when they hear their “Windows” pc has a virus.

This is all about social engineering, getting you to believe what is false to actually be true because it “sounds” true.  Don’t be fooled, don’t get tricked.  Readers of my blog here are pretty smart and there’s no reason you should get stung by the bad guys.  Be sure to let your friends and family know that the bad guys are stepping up their approach and they should ALWAYS be on the lookout for scam artists.