A narrow escape
Last week my computer broke down and could not be restarted. I decided temporarily to use an old computer of 10 years ago which still was functioning although I received many error messages. I realized that this computer was not protected as well as new computers, but, given that I expected to use this computer only a few days, I continued with it.
Two days later I received a phone call on my fixed telephone line of a woman who said that she contacted me because my computer was used to spread viruses on many other computers and for hacking. I was aware that this could be a way of attacking my computer as well, therefore, I asked for an identification. She said that she was an member of the support team of Microsoft. I asked her to show a proof of this. She told me that she could show me on my computer the proof. The proof was a similar picture as I show below.
Two days later I received a phone call on my fixed telephone line of a woman who said that she contacted me because my computer was used to spread viruses on many other computers and for hacking. I was aware that this could be a way of attacking my computer as well, therefore, I asked for an identification. She said that she was an member of the support team of Microsoft. I asked her to show a proof of this. She told me that she could show me on my computer the proof. The proof was a similar picture as I show below.
I realized that everybody can make such a proof. But then she told me that they had detected two hackers who used my computer for their purposes. She presented the names on my computer. One name of a person from Columbia and another from Nicaragua.
Then she told me that my computer was full of viruses and suggested to clean my computer from a distance if I would help her. This was a complex process which took around an hour. During that time she took over more and more control of my computer from a distance. At some point she said “the computer now is clean again and you can use it again”.
Now she wanted to determine who the hackers really were because they use fake names during their work. The procedure to detect them is “to send to them a message about an amount of money from your account to them. If the message has been opened, we can detect the person behind that name”. I was again hesitant to do so but, given the way she had helped me to clean my computer during an hour, I thought that it was reasonable to cooperate.
She asked me the number of my credit card to transfer a small amount of money to the first hacker. She said that it would be a fake message and I would not lose any money by this action, it was only to detect the person behind the hacker´s names.
I saw that she made a payment of 300 euros to the name of the first hacker she had mentioned before. I had to confirm to my bank that this money should be payed from my bank account. Although I still had doubt about this act I thought that the risk was relatively small and confirmed the acceptance of this payment. Then appeared on my computer information that this money was sent to that person and we were waiting that it would be accepted at the other side.
While we were waiting for the result she said that it would be helpful if I would provide them with the number of our bank account. That request was for me finally the indication that something was really wrong. Irmtraud was also looking at what was going on and was extremely annoyed about the whole process. She also thought that this process really was an attack on our account if not also on the bank itself.
I told them that this process took too long, more than two hours and that we had to eat something. I said “If you give me your telephone number I will call you back later”. Hesitantly she gave me a number in the USA and I stopped the communication. We phoned the number and it was not existing. Then we knew that something really wrong was occurring.
We called our local bank but there was nobody available at the moment. Then we called a person in our complex who was director of another branch of the same bank and asked for advice. She suggested to immediately block our credit cards. That we did and she checked out bank account. She reported that some days ago indeed an unsuccessful effort was made to get money from our account but not this day. Later on the same day she reported that three more efforts were made to transfer money from our account which also had failed.
This was one of our most terrible adventures, fortunately without serious consequences. I have to admit that I behaved rather stupidly in this process while these hackers used a very intelligent process to mislead me. We were fortunate to realize a narrow escape.
Then she told me that my computer was full of viruses and suggested to clean my computer from a distance if I would help her. This was a complex process which took around an hour. During that time she took over more and more control of my computer from a distance. At some point she said “the computer now is clean again and you can use it again”.
Now she wanted to determine who the hackers really were because they use fake names during their work. The procedure to detect them is “to send to them a message about an amount of money from your account to them. If the message has been opened, we can detect the person behind that name”. I was again hesitant to do so but, given the way she had helped me to clean my computer during an hour, I thought that it was reasonable to cooperate.
She asked me the number of my credit card to transfer a small amount of money to the first hacker. She said that it would be a fake message and I would not lose any money by this action, it was only to detect the person behind the hacker´s names.
I saw that she made a payment of 300 euros to the name of the first hacker she had mentioned before. I had to confirm to my bank that this money should be payed from my bank account. Although I still had doubt about this act I thought that the risk was relatively small and confirmed the acceptance of this payment. Then appeared on my computer information that this money was sent to that person and we were waiting that it would be accepted at the other side.
While we were waiting for the result she said that it would be helpful if I would provide them with the number of our bank account. That request was for me finally the indication that something was really wrong. Irmtraud was also looking at what was going on and was extremely annoyed about the whole process. She also thought that this process really was an attack on our account if not also on the bank itself.
I told them that this process took too long, more than two hours and that we had to eat something. I said “If you give me your telephone number I will call you back later”. Hesitantly she gave me a number in the USA and I stopped the communication. We phoned the number and it was not existing. Then we knew that something really wrong was occurring.
We called our local bank but there was nobody available at the moment. Then we called a person in our complex who was director of another branch of the same bank and asked for advice. She suggested to immediately block our credit cards. That we did and she checked out bank account. She reported that some days ago indeed an unsuccessful effort was made to get money from our account but not this day. Later on the same day she reported that three more efforts were made to transfer money from our account which also had failed.
This was one of our most terrible adventures, fortunately without serious consequences. I have to admit that I behaved rather stupidly in this process while these hackers used a very intelligent process to mislead me. We were fortunate to realize a narrow escape.