The Vent and Rant Thread

[Sirtel]

Originally Posted by JSWolf

Have you ever had the "You've been involved in an accident and you didn't even know it" or the "Your Windows PC has a virus and we'd like to fix it for you.". calls.

"We'll help you invest your money and get rich quickly" and "Your bank here, we need your help with catching an employee involved in money laundering". Unbelievably, several people have fallen for those scams.

Never in Estonian, though. So the targets are mostly local Russians or those Estonians who speak Russian fluently.

[Terisa de morgan]

Originally Posted by JSWolf

Have you ever had the "You've been involved in an accident and you didn't even know it" or the "Your Windows PC has a virus and we'd like to fix it for you.". calls.

The second one a lot, both in Spanish and English. My mother have received calls in English, so she hang (she only speaks Spanish). A friend of mine received it and her answer was: "Sorry, I only use linux". The speaker cursed and hang on her.

[Sirtel]

Trying to sleep while my cat is hogging both the space and the sheet.

Yes, I'll grit my teeth and suffer in silence. On no account will I disturb His Furry Majesty.

[DiapDealer]

Originally Posted by Terisa de morgan

The second one a lot, both in Spanish and English. My mother have received calls in English, so she hang (she only speaks Spanish). A friend of mine received it and her answer was: "Sorry, I only use linux". The speaker cursed and hang on her.

I just tell them I don't have a computer. I used to play with them until they got angry and hung up, but I don't have the time for them any more. A screening landline has all but ended any such unsolicited calls to my house. They need to say their name and push a button, or the phone never rings on my end. Very few scammers/telemarketers will take those extra steps.

[JSWolf]

Originally Posted by DiapDealer

I just tell them I don't have a computer. I used to play with them until they got angry and hung up, but I don't have the time for them any more. A screening landline has all but ended any such unsolicited calls to my house. They need to say their name and push a button, or the phone never rings on my end. Very few scammers/telemarketers will take those extra steps.

We have that sourt of screening on our landline. Since I had that put in place, the spam has stopped and I don't get any on my cell phone.

[ekbell]

I've never received a call pretending to be a relative but we get plenty of calls pretending to be Amazon (generally calling about our non-existent Amazon Prime account) or Services Canada.

My policy is that if you are not going to bother to ask for someone by name then I'm hanging up - unless caller ID states you are one of the charities that collects old clothing, I'm willing to be possibly scammed out of old clothing. If you say you are from a branch of the government or Amazon, I'm going to hang up, they can't be bothered to make phone calls.

[John F]

I got the computer virus call once while I was driving. I played along and let them walk me through a couple of steps.

[DNSB]

Originally Posted by JSWolf

"Your Windows PC has a virus and we'd like to fix it for you.". calls.

Oh, yes. Those are so much fun! I once kept one group on the phone for close to 2 hours before they hung up on me. Nothing like an "inability" to follow the simplest directions combined with endlessly mistyping the stuff they want you to enter to keep me amused. Then there was the call from Jake with a heavy Indian accent letting me know that I was being investigated for having and distributing kiddy porn from my computer. If I didn't co-operate, the police would be at my door within minutes. That one had an amusing do you have a credit card whose number starts with 3?, no, perhaps 5?, etc. routine. That one ended with some discussion of my ancestry.

[BetterRed]

I only have a cell phone, rarely get spam calls - usually in Mandarin or Filipino accented English. I just hangup.

But I got an interesting email recently - the sender claimed to have access to the camera on my computer which they'd used to capture video's of me masturbating whilst watching porn. . . you know the rest… binned. If I could have, I would have told them you're wasting your time sunshine, because:

• My desktop doesn't have a camera,
• The camera on my Surface Go is disabled at the EUFI and there's blob of grey epoxy on the camera
• And my cell phone doesn't have a camera because it's not a smartphone.

I am only aware of two photo's bearing my facial image - one on my ID card, the other in my passport… afaik that's it. Although I assume there are photos and video's of me taken on the local OneState CCTV cameras… but given I don't carry my dumb cellphone the local Guardians couldn't easily ID me.

Not sure 'what/who' the sender thought I was, presumably someone with a reputation to protect. They ought to know that cis-gender balding males in their eighties, with medication induced erectile dysfunction, who never rated sex that highly anyway, don't give a rats-ass about their rep.

BR

[Terisa de morgan]

Originally Posted by BetterRed

I only have a cell phone, rarely get spam calls - usually in Mandarin or Filipino accented English. I just hangup.

But I got an interesting email recently - the sender claimed to have access to the camera on my computer which they'd used to capture video's of me masturbating whilst watching porn. . . you know the rest… binned. If I could have, I would have told them you're wasting your time sunshine, because:

• My desktop doesn't have a camera,
• The camera on my Surface Go is disabled at the EUFI and there's blob of grey epoxy on the camera
• And my cell phone doesn't have a camera because it's not a smartphone.

I am only aware of two photo's bearing my facial image - one on my ID card, the other in my passport… afaik that's it. Although I assume there are photos and video's of me taken on the local OneState CCTV cameras… but given I don't carry my dumb cellphone the local Guardians couldn't easily ID me.

Not sure 'what/who' the sender thought I was, presumably someone with a reputation to protect. They ought to know that cis-gender balding males in their eighties, with medication induced erectile dysfunction, who never rated sex that highly anyway, don't give a rats-ass about their rep.

BR

That's a common scam. I got it at the computer laptop too... It was reported as scam at the company outlook

[ownedbycats]

I've gotten that email too, threatening to release the video from my nonexistent webcam to all the contacts on my nonexistent Facebook account. Also I'm aro/ace and don't watch porn.

[Sirtel]

I've also gotten it. While I do have a web camera, I'm asexual and don't visit porn sites, so I ignored it. Of course no nonexistent videos were distributed.

Last I got that scam was many years ago, though. The investment and banking scams are the current trend here.

[ApK]

V&R veering sliiiightly into TMI....

[DNSB]

Originally Posted by ApK

V&R veering sliiiightly into TMI....

Sliiiiightly? I think V&R has done a hard east turn at next Wednesday.

[Sirtel]

Originally Posted by ApK

V&R veering sliiiightly into TMI....

TMI is the whole point of V&R.