I’m not going to mention names, but this is absolutely true, told to me by the victim.
Absolutely a true story.
He starts his story, –and I am paraphrasing.
I nodded. I heard this one before.
Mr. Smith, “Yep. He told me he would check and if 90% of my computer was infected, he would have to clean it. A meter type thing that was running and then he showed scrolling down the screen all kinds of scrambled words and numbers. The voice on the other line told me that these were all viruses or malware; and, unfortunately, I was infected beyond simple recovery.”
Still nodding. The case sounded eerily familiar. I’ve heard it before.
Then two days ago so-called Microsoft rep called back. He told me that his company lost the contract with Microsoft and he could no longer support my computer so he would have to refund my money. That sounded good so I continued listening.
He continued; ‘This transfer is coming from China and sometimes they send more than they should; so all I ask you is to send me everything over the $300 I owe you.”
Then James Smith got on his computer and saw that an extra $2,300 was put in his account. Cool. So the voice on the phone told him to go to Walmart and take out a money-gram for the $2,000 overage…”but don’t hang up the phone!”
Now Smith was getting a little suspicious, so on the way to Walmart he stopped at his bank and check his account on the ATM machine. There was no extra money in his account. He knew then it was a scam. The caller insisted he doesn’t hang up.
“… just don’t hang up until I tell you to.”
The Money-gram clerk let him use her phone after he explained what was happening. He called 911 and soon a deputy sheriff showed up.
In the meantime, James hung up on with scammer several time but he kept calling back. He would give him a tongue-lashing for withholding ‘his’ money.
Next time the phone rang the deputy sheriff took the phone and asked if he could help. The voice on the other end said he was the FBI and he need to talk to James Smith. The deputy told him the FBI didn’t use restricted numbers and the number he called on is being traced. The caller hung up immediately.
When James got home his computer screen is black and would not turn back on.
He brought it to Urban E Recycling and shredded the hard drive and scrapped the computer, closed the bank account and opened a new one.
I am telling you this story for two reasons. One, so it doesn’t happen to the readers of this article; and number two reason, so it will encourage others to tell their story of fraudulent activities.
We, as a good citizens, must report and record these stories. They will help everyone become aware of how prevalent these offenses are. It also will emphasize the need for more protection from these cyber criminals.
Urban E Recycling is dedicated to do what we can to protect the personal information on your hard drive. We shred all hard drives to complete destruction resulting in non-recoverable data.
Recap: Yes, Mr. James Smith was really lucky that he didn’t lose the $2300.00, but he did lose $300.00.
He confided in me that $2300 would wipe him out and overdraw his bank account.
