Well that's a new one...
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Pressing '1' does two things. First, it often passes you through to the live agent (robo-callers are paid even less so they don't waste money until the think they've caught a live one). Second, and the much worse part: you have confirmed to them an active and viable phone number to call back with their other warnings (and sell, probably more lucrative). It's like (foolishly) clicking "remove me from mailing list" on SPAM.
"The difference between genius and stupidity is that genius has its limits." - Albert Einstein
"If you are searching for perfection in others, then you seek disappointment. If you seek perfection in yourself, then you will find failure." - Balboos HaGadol Mar 2010
Makes sense. I was looking for an obscure technical reason, but as usually... Occam's razor provides the best explanation.
M.D.V. ;) If something has a solution... Why do we have to worry about?. If it has no solution... For what reason do we have to worry about? Help me to understand what I'm saying, and I'll explain it better to you Rating helpful answers is nice, but saying thanks can be even nicer.
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Department of anti-crime seems an obvious one.
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Just had a call, (recorded message), from "The National Crime Agency". Apparently there's been "suspicious activity on my National Insurance Number", which means it's going to be suspended, immediately. :wtf: I was asked to "press 1 to speak to a Crime Agency Officer". I've decided not to bother and see how it goes! :sigh:
I don't remember details of the following news report but it involved a scam phone call where the homeowner got fed up and answered the message. When the scammer started talking to him the homeowner unloaded on him, called him filthy names and then hung up. Shortly thereafter, his home was surrounded by police and he was handcuffed. It seems the scammer phoned the police using the homeowners number on call display and told the police " I just shot and killed my wife".
73
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Just had a call, (recorded message), from "The National Crime Agency". Apparently there's been "suspicious activity on my National Insurance Number", which means it's going to be suspended, immediately. :wtf: I was asked to "press 1 to speak to a Crime Agency Officer". I've decided not to bother and see how it goes! :sigh:
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Richard MacCutchan wrote:
claimed they were from Microsoft support and, "we have seen a problem with your computer on the internet".
As a Microsoft contractor, I just tell these guys Microsoft has an army of lawyers just salivating at the thought of going after fraudsters like them, and they're just a phonecall away, should I decide to bring this to their attention. They typically don't stay too long on the call after this.
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When they used to actually have people call, I said " I want your name, your company's name and address." Funny, I never got a reply.
I once went along with one of these guys a few years ago just to see where it would lead. He tried to assure me that he had tracked me down through some "unique identifier" assigned to my computer that it was somehow magically broadcasting over the internet. Told him I've been working in the hardware/software asset management area for decades (it is the case), and that unique identifiers is one thing that pretty much all computers lack. Intel tried to introduce serial numbers with the Pentium III, and was very, very quickly made aware that it was a bad idea. Everything he was throwing at me, I calmly explained how and why everything in the script he was following didn't make sense. He gave up trying to convince me of the legitimacy of his call and hung up.
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Man, all I ever get is a clip of the message on my VM. "...or, press 9 to be removed from our list" No, I don't answer unknown numbers. They can leave a VM and I'll get back to them if it's real. It never is...
How do you know they're never real? You could have won a whole pile of money and not even know ;)
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How do you know they're never real? You could have won a whole pile of money and not even know ;)
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Richard MacCutchan wrote:
claimed they were from Microsoft support and, "we have seen a problem with your computer on the internet".
As a Microsoft contractor, I just tell these guys Microsoft has an army of lawyers just salivating at the thought of going after fraudsters like them, and they're just a phonecall away, should I decide to bring this to their attention. They typically don't stay too long on the call after this.
I personally prefer the "you've just stumbled into an FBI honeypot".
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I personally prefer the "you've just stumbled into an FBI honeypot".
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Just had a call, (recorded message), from "The National Crime Agency". Apparently there's been "suspicious activity on my National Insurance Number", which means it's going to be suspended, immediately. :wtf: I was asked to "press 1 to speak to a Crime Agency Officer". I've decided not to bother and see how it goes! :sigh:
I've had this as well, three calls in all with the last one telling me an arrest warrant had been issued for me. That one was particularly fun as I work for the county police force....hopefully they won't have any difficulty in finding me. :laugh: