Microsoft South Africa has warned local customers to be wary of a phone scam after a cybercriminals claiming to be representatives of the company left consumers out of pocket.
The scammers make use of public phone directories to get information about consumers that can be used to gain their trust.
They claim to be from the Windows Helpdesk, Windows Service Centre, Microsoft Tech Support, Microsoft Support, Windows Technical Department Support Group or Microsoft’s Research and Development Team.
The caller claims he or she is looking into a computer problem or virus and will also attempt to convince the user to install malware on their device in order to obtain banking data.
“In reality, the scammer only tricked unsuspecting consumers into believing that there is a problem and that paying a fee would be the best way to sort the issues out. Often they will also push clients to purchase a one year computer maintenance subscription,” said Ashleigh Fenwick, Microsoft South Africa’s communications manager.
The company has urged its customers not to give out credit card details to anyone claiming to be from Microsoft customer support.
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