The New York Times reported that a number of governments have banded together to combat Internet con artists. The Federal Trade Commission (FTC) was joined by “the Australian Communications and Media Authority, the Canadian Radio-Television and Telecommunications Commission, and Britain’s Serious Organized Crime Agency. This multinational crackdown on so-called tech support scams, in which:

…a caller fools a consumer into believing Microsoft or a computer security company has discovered that a PC is infected with harmful software. The caller then offers to fix the computer on the spot for a price. The target would sometimes let the ostensible tech support company gain remote access to his computer, allowing the company to download software to it. 

Sometimes it is hard to believe people can be so gullible…hopefully this international effort will help reduce this form of Internet crime.

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