I've just received a telephone call from someone claiming to be from Microsoft (she spoke English and sounded Indian?). She said my computer was sending messages to MS that it had some sort of problem (it has had a problem with a virus but I thought it was ok now).
She wanted to talk me through how to cure this problem. It involved pressing the windows key and R key together and accessing something called Teamviewer.
I said I didn't want to buy anything or download anything onto my computer. So she tried to convince me she was genuine by quoting my MS license number, which she did correctly. I know nothing about computers so I didn't know whether she could easily have access to this or not.
In the end it sounded so unlikely to me (spooky even, my drone computer calling out to its mother!) that I said I could not do it unless my husband was there as it was his computer.
So all you IT people out there - is this genuine? She is ringing back at 6pm tonight so I need the answer before then.
I had the same call a month ago. It was an Indian gentleman but the call contents was the same.
At first I thought it was Microsoft because I had inadvertently clicked on one of those send "Report error" messages that MS OSs bring up when something crashes but I couldn't really understand what the chap was saying as his accent was quite strong so I got him to repeat what he was saying several times - each time a little slower and then after that I told him I had fixed it myself (whatever he tried to explain) and put the phone down.
simple, companies like dell etc use the same license key on all there pc's, they have a standard build, if you look at the license number on the sticker on the pc somewhere it'll be different to the one actually installed on your machine. so they either bought your details from whoever you got your pc from or they just guessed you had a dell/ibm/compaq etc
Teamviewer is a programme that allows another person to view EVERYTHING in your computer, your computer becomes "their" computer ... to control and alter things at their whim.
That's (microsoft) a scam but regarding team viewer: I don't know if it's the same software which I used to hack my friends PC just for fun; however, in order to have a full control to other computer staying at a distance and controlling it VIA internet one has to set-up the client teamviewer in the PC which needs to be hacked. Afterwards, when teamviewer program once runs on the main server a password is needed(which one has to select at the time of client installation) to get access in to the clients PC. Once the password is given correctly there is 2 mode
1) Stealth mode : spies the client desktop whatever user has been doing
2) Acess mode : can open, close, delete, browse and do all sorts of things which normally one can do sitting in front of their PC
Still 1 question prompts in my mind - why some one calls you if they've already installed the client in your PC (only if whatever I assumed is correct)
When I recently wanted to install a VPN system on my laptop, for viewing UK tv, the company involved wanted me to use Teamviewer, to 'help' me through installing their system, but some little voice in my head told me not to do it.
Thanks to the EF a local computer expert sent me a personal message and came and set it all up for me without the use of Teamviewer.