Vishing attack at work

Yesterday I received a funny phone call. I answered it like any other call I get at the help desk. It went as follows (not exactly word for word but very close):

"IT this is Ronnie"
"Yes this is the computer guy. I've been helping you with your computer for the past few months."
"I'm sorry, who are you looking for?"
"I'm the computer guy. I'll need access to you computer to help you again."
"I'm actually an IT guy so if anyone is going to work on my computer it's going to be me."
"You must not remember then. I've been helping you with your computer."

At this point I just hung up. I wish I would have went along with it a bit longer. I know that unsuspecting people fall for this, but I would think they would be better at it! He must have been a rookie at trying to scam people. He was just the "computer guy". No mention of a company or his "name" to try to sound more official.

Anyone else been on the receiving end of one of these calls? It was amusing because I'm studying for Sec+ as well

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MAC_Addy

I've heard of this before from a couple of coworkers. I also watched a YouTube video of a guy that kept on getting these calls. He ended up creating a virtual machine and letting them access his computer - he acted like he knew nothing, it was hilarious. The other person on the phone ended up deleting a bunch of documents and started on his system files, if I remember correctly. I'll have to try and find that video...

SecurityThroughObscurity

It was Kevin Mitnick from the past.

RomBUS

Wow I remember there was a trend of that going around in my area around 3-4 (maybe more?) years ago. These guys would pose calling from Dell or HP when they started doing remote assistance for majority of their calls

Surprised this method is still kicking

ScrawnyRonnie

MAC_Addy wrote: »

I've heard of this before from a couple of coworkers. I also watched a YouTube video of a guy that kept on getting these calls. He ended up creating a virtual machine and letting them access his computer - he acted like he knew nothing, it was hilarious. The other person on the phone ended up deleting a bunch of documents and started on his system files, if I remember correctly. I'll have to try and find that video...

I think I found it when looking up the new version of Malwarebytes. This video was posted by them.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FDJWixw4TCI

JBrown

"The technician is always right" - brilliant.

ScrawnyRonnie

I just got a call on my cell phone with an automated message to lower my interest rate. I pressed 1 to talk to someone just for fun. After he explained all this made up stuff he asked me for some information on my card. I wasted his time for a while then told him I only have a debit card and didn't know why I got a call to lower an interest rate on a card I don't even have. Scammers be n00bs

paul78

Yeah - this is really a pretty serious threat to some organizations. Our mandatory security awareness training for all our employees actually includes how to sniff this out.

Although, I will admit that one of my favourite things to watch is Defcon Social Engineering CTF.

jvrlopez

ScrawnyRonnie wrote: »

I just got a call on my cell phone with an automated message to lower my interest rate. I pressed 1 to talk to someone just for fun. After he explained all this made up stuff he asked me for some information on my card. I wasted his time for a while then told him I only have a debit card and didn't know why I got a call to lower an interest rate on a card I don't even have. Scammers be n00bs

I get these at least once a day. When I get to my phone after work, I always see missed calls from spoofed numbers. Blocking doesn't do anything since its a new number everyday. Answering and pressing 1 doesn't do anything. I even applied my cell number to the DNCL but it still happens. Annoying.