A list of useful lies

...in which I provide a list of good lies to tell bad people who want to take over your PC

As you may remember, not long ago I was threatened with jail by a nasty man who wanted to get control of my computer, or make me download a virus or somesuch thing (I'm still free, despite my apparently heinous crime of refusing to believe him).  Since I get 2 - 3 of these calls a month, I have started coming up with lies/ploys to use to get them to hang up before I do.

I do this purely for my own amusement - if you get one of these calls that begins with "I'm calling from Microsoft/Windows Service Department/Windows Maintenance Department/some other official sounding organisation" and claims you have a virus and need to immediately install Remove-O-Virus 2012 because McAfee/Norton/AVG/whatever doesn't work, by far your best course of action is to hang up immediately.  I just like the thought of some guy thinking he's getting somewhere and then realising that I'm taking the mickey, plus it stops him calling up and annoying somebody else.


This technique is not unique to me at all - just about any vaguely technical type will probably do something very similar if they have time, because we're a bit sick and twisted like that.
Anyway, here are some lies (or at least they're lies for me - they might not be for you!) you can tell if you're too polite to hang up immediately, or if they are persistent - I've had one guy call me back 5 times after I told him I knew he was trying to scam me - that should get them to hang up:


1) I run Unix/use a Mac (when they ask you to open Windows Event Viewer or click the start button) - this will almost always result in them getting off the phone pretty much instantly.


2) I don't have a computer - they're only calling you because you're on a list of random phone numbers they've got from somewhere.  They don't know you've got a computer, so tell them you haven't and they'll hang up (if you really haven't, this has the merit of not being a lie).


3) I don't have Internet access - if you don't have Internet access they can't do much, since their scam usually relies on you going to a website.  I guess they might try to get you to buy software over the phone, in which case just hang up. Do not under any circumstances give them any information that you would not want to give to a criminal.


4) The computer was taken by the bailiffs - credit to my wife for this one.


5) Ask them to hold while you turn the computer on and wait to see how long it takes before they hang up


If you're fairly tech-savvy yourself I have no doubt you have your own favourite ways to torment these people, but for entertainment's sake here are some of mine:


Pretend to play along while actually playing on the PC on whatever game you feel like. 


Pretend to be on dial up so that whatever site they tell you to go to takes ages to load...then just after you tell them it's loaded, hang up.


Let them get to the part in their script where they show you the *.inf files that they will claim to be infections (because everybody knows virus writers like to make it easy to identify their products) and then tell them that these are device driver information files.


Say that the PC is off and that you need to boot it up, then that it's running Scandisk  because there's an error on your hard disk.  After about 3 minutes tell them it's got to 2%.  They may actually stay on the line until you say it's finished (people have reported them hanging on for anything up to 30 minutes), in which case you could say that Windows won't start because the disk is too badly damaged.  (Credit to Dave at http://lakeuk.blogspot.com/2011/07/cold-phone-call-international-routing.html for the start-up idea).


Pretend to have typed in the code they will give you to let them take control of your computer then scream "It's melting! My computer's melting!" before hanging up.


Note that if you do any of these, they may become aggressive and abusive - just hang up.


On a serious note, some ways you can recognise these calls (if any single one of these is true you can be pretty much sure it's a scam call):

• They mention the "International Routing System"
• They claim to be from "Microsoft's Technical Department", "Windows Troubleshooting" or anything similar (see here and here) 
• They try to get you to go to a website and download any kind of executable file

There's no foolproof list - the best advice is to maintain a healthy level of skepticism about unsolicited calls.  Very few large corporations will call users like this, and Microsoft certainly do not. 


C.