Tech scammers dupe, steal information

A computer shop in Troy is concerned that scammers are finding lesser known ways to dupe residents into giving out their personal information before taking their money – and with some success.

Greg Goodman of All Systems Go said four people had come to the shop in the last three weeks with computer problems after scammers claiming to be from reputable companies made contact and then managed to talk people into giving up their personal information. This was before demanding money and then locking up their computers.

It was not clear if the scammers had phoned internationally, Goodman said.

Each time the scammer made contact, they represented themselves as being from Microsoft or McAfee, and they were calling to let that person know there was a problem with their computer, Goodman said.

“The person claimed to be an employee and they will help you out at no charge,” Goodman said. “In one case they walked a woman through a process that led her to a website and had her log in. In some cases they spent up to an hour with that person. Then at some point they told that person ‘your computer is going to crash – we need $349 to fix this.’”

By this point, the scammers would have accessed that person’s information and had been able to lock the person out of the computer. Even when a person sent $349 via PayPal, they would still not able to use the computer.

“The first time I heard about it, I was surprised that (the scammers) were successful,” Goodman said. “Then I keep hearing about it – so people are obviously falling for it.”

Goodman said people had been embarrassed when they had come in with their computers and had probably not reported being scammed.

While there have been reports made to the Lincoln County Sheriff’s Office of people being contacted by various scammers, Lincoln County Sheriff Roby Bowe said there had not been any reports of people who had actually lost money to a scammer.

Donna O’Neil, who manages Alpha Computers & Hobbies in Libby said scams like the one Goodman described had been around for awhile, but people obviously still fell for them.

“They are common, but they tend to come in waves,” O’Neil said, adding that it wasn’t clear if people were calling from overseas.

“Sometimes you don’t have this happen for awhile, and then there might be two to three reports of this a day,” O’Neil said. “It seems to be something that has ramped up in the last five years.”

Goodman’s wife, Laurie Goodman, who was also at the Troy store when people came in with their computers, said while people of all ages seemed to be more educated on how scammers operate, the latest one seemed a little more sophisticated.

“A lot of people here are still new to technology,” Laurie said. “They are starting to learn you don’t click onto links in emails, but they don’t know yet about people calling to ask you to log in remotely before asking for money.”