Greg's Corner

Inside the Tech Support Scam!

If you’re not familiar with tech support scam, it’s an insidious scheme designed to hijack your computer for one reason or another. Groups of scammers will robocall people claiming to be from Microsoft. They’ll tell their victims that they have a virus on their computer and will ask for remote access to the victim’s computer in order to fix the problem. What they’re really doing is either injecting malware into the victim’s computer or stealing personal information from the victim. However, one man has made it his mission to scam the scammers.

A man who goes by the pseudonym of ‘Jim Browning’ is skilled enough that he’s able to take control of the scammers’ computer when they try to take control of his. In one particular instance that Browning has posted to YouTube, he was able to not only spy on the scam call center but he was also able to change the scammers’ outgoing robocall message to warn people that the call is a scam. Browning recently told CBS This Morning that the reason he’s doing this is to make more people aware of the scam.

[youtube https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xb_rgQ4IDS8%5D

Normally, it’s encouraged by security experts that if you receive one of these phone calls the best thing to do is hang up. Also if you see a pop up on your computer claiming that you have a virus be suspicious and try running an anti-malware program like Malwarebytes instead. While Mr. Browning’s methods may be unorthodox sometimes it takes a new way of thinking to combat the con men.