Solved New twist to scamming

[Borg 386]

I volunteer my time to look at/fix PC's at the place where my Wife works. They have a senior center & if someone brings in a computer with a question, I'll look at it & sort out any problems.

One guy brought his laptop in & said he recieved a call from a tech company claiming to be affiliated with MS. They remotely accessed his computer & then offered him a anti-malware tool, which comes with tech support for 3 years. For $199.00. Unfortunately, he agreed & put it on his credit card.

The "Anti-Malware tool" they put on his laptop was JRT. That's right, the tool that is free. They didn't even change the default icon. They just renamed it "Malware & Virus removal tool," & the author was changed to "Thisisu."

I was in shock when I saw the icon & said "You paid for this?" I showed him where it was available for free.

When he asked me for options, I told him he best talk to his credit card company,explain the circumstances & see what his options are. He told me he would call them as soon as he got home. Also, he should ask them which authorities to contact to report this.

So apparently now the scammers are charging people for free software, claiming that it's their special anti virus.

I put up a note at the senior center warning people about the call scam. Lets hope everyone reads that & doesn't fall for what these jerks are doing.

 

[strollin]

Maybe the $199.00 was claimed to be an "install and setup" fee since the scammers put in a lot of labor to install that free tool. :sarc:

 

[andrew129260]

Honestly while this is incredibly horrible, I would rather them install a legit tool then some other malware or backdoor. even though they probably did.....

 

[Slartybart]

Thisisu authors JRT, so they only changed the name of the file.

:ar: This way to the egress
- BT Barnum

At least at the circus it only cost another nickel to get back into the tent. Now-a-days you can lose your life savings and your identity.

It's a shame, but people are either too trusting or very gullible ... that's why scams work.

 

[Borg 386]

Thisisu authors JRT, so they only changed the name of the file.

Wasn't sure on that, actually surprised they didn't change it also.

Yeah, it is sad that people are preying on other people like that. From what he told me, the people assured him he needed this AV & it was recommended by MS. Yeah, at least it was legit software, but still...

I saw his wife this morning as I was dropping off my Wife & she told me she called the "tech company" that called her husband, & after arguing with them for a bit, they told her they would cancel the 3 year tech support, but there would be a cancellation fee & she would still have to pay up &99 for the "services" they did. She pushed a bit more & they asked if she was a senior citizen. She said yes, to which they offered her a final price of $49.99.

They told her they would send her an E mail stating she would get a $150 refund & all she had to do was reply with "I agree." She hasn't replied yet & I told her best to see what the credit card people say she should do. She's waiting for the fraud division to call her back.

 

[strollin]

This doesn't sound like a scam to me. Perhaps the company's sales tactics are a bit underhanded, but not a scam. We don't know what services were offered for that 3 year tech support contract. If they guaranteed to remove all infections over the next 3 years it would be a fair deal. We know they installed the free software but did they do any other work such as remove existing infections or any kind of performance tuning or maintenance?

The fact that they were willing to drop the contract and return some of the money also points to a legit company.

 

[Borg 386]

Yeah, I was actually VERY surprised when the company relented like that. They claim to have optimized the PC & are charging for that, as well as installation of "Their Antivirus Tool."

I do know that they put a link on the desktop that said "Tech Support" & when I clicked it, it went nowhere, "Page not found."

 

[Slartybart]

Thisisu authors JRT, so they only changed the name of the file.

.....
They told her they would send her an E mail stating she would get a $150 refund & all she had to do was reply with "I agree." She hasn't replied yet & I told her best to see what the credit card people say she should do. She's waiting for the fraud division to call her back.

Good news.

I agree with you that the couple should rely on the Credit Card (CC) issuer, but they can be as bad as scammers sometimes.

I went round and round with AOL and my CC company in the mid 90s trying to cancel my AOL subscription.
AOL said I had to cancel inside the client - but that was already uninstalled and I was unable to reinstall with the same credentials (forget why now). I explained this to the CC issuer and they backed off the charges, only to have AOL issue them again. After explaining the situation again to the CC issuer, they finally admitted that they did all they could and I'd have to resolve it with AOL. I finally got AOL to end the subscription, but they said all they could do was authorize a 3 month reversal on the 9 months of charges! I was screwed and I wasn't a happy camper. I gave up after a few more months trying to get either the CC issuer or AOL to make me whole and learned my $120 lesson

- what lesson? I'm not sure, other than be very careful, even with so-called reputable companies (AOL).

I hope your acquaintances have better fortune. It seems that CC issuers make soooooo much money borrowing at near zero rates and charging 25-30 percent interest that they are more likely to forgive more of these types of charges. I really like the CC scam of 'money back' - they offer 2-5 % 'back' but they're already making ~ 20-25 percent, - nice business model, eh wot!

To be fair, the CC issuers do have to cover loses in defaults, but bankruptcy (the honest defaults) law changes in the past 10 years really tilt the balance in their favor.

I'm beginning to face the fact, we just can't win and they will nickel and dime us out of every penny.

I apologize if my comments take the thread off topic.

Bill
.

 

[Jacee]

Did you look at the 'properties' on the tech support link?

 

[Slartybart]

Did you look at the 'properties' on the tech support link?

Not sure what tech support link?

If your post is a reply to my post - the issue was 20 years ago, way before AOL acquired TW. I'm not getting my money back

If your post is a reply to Borg, is it reference to JRT or the scammer?

 

[andrew129260]

Jacee is referring to this:

I do know that they put a link on the desktop that said "Tech Support" & when I clicked it, it went nowhere, "Page not found."

 

[Slartybart]

Ah, thanks - cheap $tore glasses ... again!

 

[Borg 386]

Did you look at the 'properties' on the tech support link?

Yepperz, I did check to make sure it wasn't a .exe disguised as a web link.

 

[ThrashZone]

Usually details are in the contract that will usually state you'd be paying for the service not the software the service might use
Even Norton uses third party free software to clean infections when they fail to block something so the use of free goodies is normal the only difference might be Norton cleans it's tracts

 

[Borg 386]

Yeah, that is true Thrash, but I disagree with the way these people are running a somewhat underhanded service. Cold calling people, claiming to be affiliated with MS, renaming a free tool to something else & then charging for what they say is "their software." They shouldn't take credit for other peoples hard work.

I think the author of the tool might want to put a disclaimer up front like some of the free tools have, saying if you paid for this software, you were ripped off.

Unfortunately, it isn't (as far as I know) illegal to sell something that is free if someone wants to pay for it. Look at the MS store, they just recently had to clean up due to the large amount of "apps" that people were selling, & it turned out they were nothing but instructions on how to d/l the software.

I have to wonder if they decided to refund some of the money because they didn't want any complaints filed against them.

 

[ThrashZone]

The elderly are unfortunately easy prey
But yes that was an added twist rename and saying they are affiliated with Microsoft,
The BBB might be a good thing to report to along with the other used developers

All this stuff needs to be documented well so if anything misleading is in writing ? might have a good case for a refund

 

[Borg 386]

I would think a full refund, but the question is, do they have a legal leg to stand on? They paid for a product, the fact that it was free is besides the point. I haven't seen them today yet, so I don't know what the CC company told them. And the company does claim they "optimized" his PC while they were connected to it. That could anything from emptying the trash to running the Windows cleanup program.

I don't know all the facts, they could be a legit company & that's just the way they operate, although it is a lousy business model if you ask me.

 

[ThrashZone]

No doubt snakes,
But without the actual agreement to go by ?
Learning via hard knocks

Allot of these companies will give a partial refund if not full just to keep bad press or reporting quite
Some evidence does need to be collected that you found might make it easier ?
You might try to bait an email support ticket for them :devil:

 

[strollin]

Another factor here is what was actually said to the person vs how they interpreted it. Without a recording of the call we will never know. I've had calls where they'll say stuff like they are MS specialists or something similar and the person could have interpreted that to mean they were saying they were affiliated with MS. As I said earlier, the contract may have been just to optimize and maintain the PC and not an actual charge for the software. Was the callee sent an invoice?

Maybe the company contracted with the author of the software for custom branding of the software?

I really don't think this is a scam, more likely an aggressive, fast talking salesperson.

 

[Borg 386]

@ Thrash - They said the rep told them the service was cancelled, so no chance of baiting them.

@ Strollin - Yeah, that's true. Since I didn't hear the call I can't say for sure. As far as I know, they never got an invoice confirmation, E Mail or paper. I think it might be in that realm though, a fast talking salesperson preying on the fears of people having an infected PC. Close to a scam but not quite.

As far as I'm concerned though, it might as well be a scam.