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Scam / Prank / Security concern?

Anonymous
2024-05-16T17:08:36+00:00

I have just been subjected to what I can only describe as scamming behavior by the Microsoft support team.

  1. I have contacted the team through the Microsoft support website and explained my issue.
  2. I was asked for email, phone number, and a country for verification
  3. I was asked to download Microsoft Quick Assist (mac user)
  4. Shared my screen with an agent who called himself Christopher
  5. He tried to solve my issue with Excel but was eventually unable to assist. There were several long pauses of inaction. I assumed he was asking a colleague for help. But I was eventually told, they are not trained in this and given a link where to ask.
  6. I tried to say "thank you and goodbye"

THIS IS WHERE IT BECOMES SUSPICIOUS

  1. The agent said "WAIT" and started to show me how to access support if I needed again.
  2. I told him (typed), I know and this is how I contacted them in the first place.
  3. He said "good" and started "showing" it to me over and over and over again. I couldn't grab hold of my cursor. He was moving too fast. After 2-3 minutes I finally managed to break a connection with the agent.

I am now concerned about the following

  1. Could any of my personal information have been stolen on the background?
  2. Was I scammed by a member of the Microsoft Team
  3. Was this simply an unacceptable prank by an incompetent employee?
  4. Where can I report this behaviour?
Microsoft 365 and Office | Excel | For home | MacOS

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  1. Jim G 134K Reputation points MVP Volunteer Moderator
    2024-05-17T18:59:17+00:00

    Hi Anna,

    How confident you went to legitimate Microsoft support and not a site impersonating Microsoft? You didn't tell us where you actually went for support, so we have no way to confirm the site's legitimacy.

    Thinking about whether your Mac was compromised, you made no mention of being asked to grant permissions other than for installing Microsoft Quick Assist. Were you asked to grant permission after the initial install of Microsoft Quick Assist?

    Microsoft Support is fond of telling customers over and over to use Microsoft Support. It's a thing they do. That doesn't sound alarming to me.

    I would move Microsoft Quick Assist application to the trash and then empty the trash.

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