We just received a call that claimed to be an emergency notification from Microsoft that our windows license has expired and that we should call (877) 281-1578 to prevent the shut down.
Yeah right.
Lee Schierer
USNA '71
Go Navy!
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I like Bill Gates solution proposed many years ago. All phone numbers are 900 numbers. The charge is some nominal amount that wouldn't matter to an average phone customer or to a business. But to a scammer that depends on 10s of thousands of calls to find one sucker, it would be a death knell. Same thing with email. All emails are billed at $.001 and the first 200 per month are free. You and I would never notice it. But the scammer that relies on millions of emails to find one sucker couldn't afford the bill.
Billing is mostly between ISPs. I have Verizon and you have ATT. If I email you, ATT bills Verizon and Verizon charges my account. Gates suggested that the ISP's keep the fees to cover the cost of administration.
Further, Gates suggested a whitelist that customers can actively manage. So, for instance, I could put Rockler on my whitelist and they can send me emails for free. If I ever get mad at Rockler, I can log in and remove them from my whitelist. I suppose we could go further and let me charge someone more to email me. I would enjoy that.
Any legitimate business that can't bear a tenth of a cent for sending you an email is working on too thin a profit margin.
On the Windows scam, my reply has varied from extreme paranoia directed at them for spying on me, to telling them my machine is a Mac, pretending like they are talking about my glass window or just stringing them along and telling them when my TV program is over then the computer can be turned on and viewed on the TV screen.
My reply to that question is "no" then they usually hang up.If you answer an unsolicited call, a scammer may say, "Can you hear me?"
My reply to them is, "Come and get me copper, you'll never take me alive." Again, they tend to hang up.Now: Who here has had a call from the IRS (In Canada it's the Canada Revenue Agency) that there is an arrest warrent out for you for back taxes? We get that all the time.
Sometimes if it is a live person my reply is to tell them that it is against my policy to do business with criminals. If they claim they are not a criminal, they are informed that by calling people who are on the do not call list, they are in fact committing a crime and are therefore a criminal.
jtk
Last edited by Jim Koepke; 10-31-2018 at 3:00 PM. Reason: on the windows scam & not doing business with criminals
"A pessimist sees the difficulty in every opportunity; an optimist sees the opportunity in every difficulty."
- Sir Winston Churchill (1874-1965)
She always tells me there's no problem with my account so I tell her thanks for the info and talk to you later.
If you want to hear some funny conversations with the telemarketers, google Tom Mabe. He is hilarious!
Funny, I don't remember being absent minded...
Yoga class makes me feel like a total stud, mostly because I'm about as flexible as a 2x4.
"Design"? Possibly. "Intelligent"? Sure doesn't look like it from this angle.
We used to be hunter gatherers. Now we're shopper borrowers.
The three most important words in the English language: "Front Towards Enemy".
The world makes a lot more sense when you remember that Butthead was the smart one.
You can never be too rich, too thin, or have too much ammo.
Tried to sign up, never got an "Activation email" from them. Wonder if its just more phishing?
If you look more closely, it actually requires VOIP,as it has all calls going to them which are then forwarded to you; basically VOIP to your landline phone.
From the terms: "Comcast XFINITY Voice Service is an Internet Protocol (IP)-enabled communications service"...
Yeah, VOIP is what I'm using now (Spectrum).
But the way they describe it, it uses the "simultaneous ring" feature and answers their end if the number is in their database...I was under the impression that feature was available for ATT POTS lines as well, possibly depending on what level of equipment the local office has installed.
[EDIT: or not. Apparently it's not available for copper analog (their description) lines yet. Given that it's working its magic well upstream of the analog portion any given phone's connection, I'm not sure why.]
Last edited by Lee DeRaud; 11-01-2018 at 2:35 PM.
Yoga class makes me feel like a total stud, mostly because I'm about as flexible as a 2x4.
"Design"? Possibly. "Intelligent"? Sure doesn't look like it from this angle.
We used to be hunter gatherers. Now we're shopper borrowers.
The three most important words in the English language: "Front Towards Enemy".
The world makes a lot more sense when you remember that Butthead was the smart one.
You can never be too rich, too thin, or have too much ammo.
I always insist on paying them in person. Then telling them I give it to them - in Hot Lead! This is after they've told me the LOCAL POLICE were coming to arrest me. I'm still waiting.
For the computer scam it's usually from the Windows Corporation, telling me my Linux box has some problem. I string them along but haven't had a call from those idiots for some time.
-Tom
We only keep the land line for possible emergency calls. We average about 7 telemarketer calls a day, and never answer the phone unless we know the person calling, which is maybe once a week.
I clear the calls before going to bed each night, but last week I missed a night, and set a new record of 28 calls in two days. Most of our calls are hangups from R2D2.
Getting a couple a day now on the cell phone also.
Last edited by Rick Potter; 11-02-2018 at 3:54 AM.
Rick Potter
DIY journeyman,
FWW wannabe.
AKA Village Idiot.