[VillagesFlorida]

I decided to go out on to the Microsoft support forums to see if this issue had been reported by anyone else. Oh, yeah! Here is one reply that I read that seems to make a lot of sense:



These scammers simply play the odds.

Most people in developed countries have at least one computer in their home and the odds are very high that the computer will have a version of Windows installed.

They call random telephone numbers and present their scam. Eventually they will connect with a victim who is unknowledgeable about computers and will fall for the scam and give them their credit card information to pay for removing the so-called virus.

While they are removing the non-existent virus, they will also be downloading all of the victims personal information on the computer. They will get the victims email address book which has the information for many more potential victims to add to their call list.

This is a multi-million dollar business. The criminals are usually very well protected, since they operate from locations around the world that do not have a strong law enforcement presence. They may also have a legitimate business front that they use to process the credit card information that they collect.

The best defense against these scams is for everyone to spread the word and let people know that these criminals out there and how they operate.

The 'assoc' command displays all of the many file associations on the computer. When you run that command, the scammer will try and convince you that some of that information proves that there is a virus on the computer.

Another strange thing: Before THIS call came, and while I was away from home, my husband took a call from "Comcast" (??), asking to speak to me. When the so-called Comcast rep was told that I was not here he said he would call back later. I am highly suspicious now that these same scammers are claiming to represent other legitimate companies. The more I think about this the more I do not believe it was Comcast calling at all. There was no reason for them to call me. Hmmmmmmmmm?????

I am so sorry to read here that an elderly person fell victim to this awful scam. I CAN see how it might be easy to do this. Their scare tactics are very believable and their offer to fix the "problem" feels very comforting.