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Comment by mcrae | Hacker News Reader

My girlfriend was speaking to her father (mid-60s?) who was complaining about what a pain in the ass it was to get his new iPhone configured. He had called Apple support who would come the next day, but now he had to go to Wal-Mart to pickup the giftcards to pay for the service.

Wait. What?

So I guess he had Googled for iPhone support and got some bogus phone number. Aside from the potential monetary loss, the scary part was that had they come to the house, he likely would have let them in.

The world and the way in which we do business changes quickly, and red-flags for some aren't red-flags for others. But I'm really curious what search term lead to the fraudulent phone number in the first place -- how are these platforms so gameable?

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No data to back this up, but at least in my experience victims finding a phone number directly from a Google search is actually pretty uncommon. Although, sometimes you’ll see fake numbers posted in the comments of news articles or YouTube videos that rank highly for search terms like “fix virus iPhone.”

The most common way people get targeted is either via a pop-up while browsing (e.g. “Your iPhone has a virus! Call xxx xxxx now to fix”) or just random cold calls. Scammers also circulate lists of phone numbers/personal information of victims to previous scams, so once you end up as a victim of one you’re much more likely to be a target for new/more sophisticated scams.

Probably not the norm, but I have worked alongside a tech company that has 30+ million user accounts, and as such, has a pretty much constant stream of scammers wishing to take advantage of our user base.

The customer support dept. has a phone number to call, which is listed on the website. But you'd be amazed how many people are willing to call some random number so long as it shows up in a google result. Normally, it's older folks that fall for this type of scam.

The fraud dept. sends a handful of take-down requests to google per week; but it really doesn't do much to stem the incoming flow of support hotline scams. Once a number is taken down, they just create a new website and new fake number.

To reply to your comment more directly, I have no idea whether or not this scam type accounts for a significant portion of scams overall, but for my particular industry it sure is. In any account, the way people are scammed on our site changes all the time depending on what's available/easiest for the scammers, so the methods they use are constantly changing/adapting.

I've read on HN that "bad"[0] numbers pop up on Google Maps, though this was in reference of businesses making fake listings to capture customers that look for a service near where they live. Could scammers be doing that too? I imagine "iPhone repair" being something people type into Google Maps.

[0] - What would be the right word for both scammers and dishonest but technically legitimate businesses?

Last year, I had to call Brother customer support to debug a WiFi issue for my printer. I googled their customer service number and clicked on the first page on the SERP. The page looked legit, and when I called, it was an Indian man who offered support. This wasn’t the first time I called support, and the first time, I was directed to a phone tree. This time, someone picked up directly.

Everything else seemed very normal, until he told me he needed to install 2 programs- 1 was something I had no idea what it was, and the other was a screen sharing + remote login service (I’ve never heard of this software before).

My suspicions were high, so I probed why he needed me to do all this, and he said “because it’s standard service sir. Please let me provide the same.” I noped out of there. Point being: I really wasn’t sure if I was being scammed, but had I not been exposed to various screen sharing software before, I would’ve easily agreed to share my screen in desperation and installed something I’ve never heard of.

Just an anecdotal story of how easy it is to get defrauded off a google search.

I have a friend who got to a bogus HP support line via a Google search. This was a few years ago.

It’s not surprising.

People want to be able to call someone for help.

Meanwhile most companies do NOT want you to call them, but want you to figure out how to solve the problem yourself with varying quality of online help.

I ran a small directory of phone numbers, like gethuman before it was a thing.

Every time I came across a company that made it difficult to find their support number, I’d publish a page.

It wasn’t hard for me to rank higher than large telcos or banks in my country.

No wonder why people fall for someone offering a convenient number for help.

Because the vendors themselves certainly aren’t.

By now there are clear red flags that everyone should know about. For example: no legitimate service anywhere asks to be paid by buying gift cards. No company’s tech support, no police departments, and no government agencies will ask for gift cards. A lot of places that sell gift cards now even have signs up warning people about scams. Why do people keep falling for this one?

If you have elderly parents, no matter how sharp they are, it’s worth it to take some time and sit with them and go over the basics.

How are people so "gameable" (gullible)?

Tech support, from a big-name company no less, wanting to get paid in Walmart gift cards? Jesus fucking Christ, how can you believe that.

If you’re an older person who grew up in, say, the 1940s, is “company wants to be paid in scrip purchased at local store” really weirder than “instant social interaction worldwide via a small handheld piece of glass”?

In other words, the world is new and different to some people. What’s obviously “gaming” to you is not necessarily clear to others.

I don’t buy the “tech-illiterate” idea.

In my opinion, these are the same type of people that would have given all their livestock to a medieval-traveling pastor because God would have smite them if they didn’t.

The victims are overwhelmingly elderly. Are they experiencing normal cognitive decline, is it a brain disease, or were they always like this?

You have to be astonishingly ignorant of how the world works to fall for this stuff. What does this say about their ability to participate in an election? They’re eligible to vote, but it seems like even a 12 year old would run circles around them mentally.

> What does this say about their ability to participate in an election?

The USA elected someone to Presidency who is widely suspected to suffer from mental degeneration.

IMO it's a cultural difference: there are people who constantly engage their minds even at age 70+ and can make young people look pale against them in using computers, and there are people who stopped using their minds in their 40s and it shows.

Jeez man, get off your high horse a bit. There are billions of people out there, young and old, who have no clue about these things (meaning some prepaid vouchers aren't a normal form of pay for IT stuff).

Its not about ignorance of how world works, their normal world doesn't involve such technology and they never get to the point of being comfortable of new cool tech and don't follow it. Its not ideal, and it doesn't absolve them from their share of blame for the situation, but it is what it is.

If you read about the world of scams, people routinely receive calls from people claiming to represent entities such as the IRS or a Sheriff's Department, and convince the victim they are in legal jeopardy which can be alleviated immediately by transferring significant sums of money in the form of eBay, iTunes or Amazon gift cards. So, it's not just about tech repair.

I don't think it can be argued that it's reasonable to think the sheriff or the IRS can be paid through iTunes gift cards.

No clue that major corporations don't take payment in the form of gift cards and vouchers?

Don't think I'm on a high-horse. Believing that is monumentally stupid.

Kitboga

YouTube.

Very entertaining.

this is worth checking out. helps to have someone explain what is going on. youtube is a good place to start. guy also has a twitch channel with a phenomenal amount of viewers.

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