First, when traveling make sure you are taking good care of yourself. The stomach bug I brought back from Italy was accompanied by a really stubborn, horrible cold. I’m coughing, hacking, sneezing and sniffling like it’s mid-winter.
Second, I have a rather embarassing tale to tell about why I have been off-line a lot of this week. Tuesday morning was such a beautiful morning that I took myself out for a walk right after I got up. But with the cold, I may have pushed myself a little too hard – the last 1/2 mile to get home, I felt like I was walking through waist deep pudding. And I had only taken 2 tissues – which was definitely not enough! So between the cold pills and feeling weird after my walk, I laid down for a little bit – only to be awakened by my phone.
Given that I’m on a job search – and that I’m in the interview process! – I answer my phone much more regularly than I used to. Normally, most calls I get during the day are people offering me car warranties or cleaning services or financial services but since there is the chance right now that it could be a prospective new employer, I answer! The call that woke me up was from an 800 number and the caller identified himself as being from the fraud team at Xfinity. To my credit, I asked him how I knew he was from Xfinity – and he sent an email to me that had a real Comcast service email address when I checked it out to see if it was a scam email.
The story I was told was that they were seeing a great deal of activity on my WiFi router that seemed fraudulent. They asked me to go to my router and tell them what lights were on and what color they are. Then they asked me to get on my computer and they gave me a web address to go to so that we could check the settings for my router. Next thing I knew, they asked me to download software – and I fell for it. Over the next 1/2 hour or so, he asked me to try to track down a fraudulent charge by looking through my bank accounts. But I have 2 factor sign in on all my bank accounts so he wasn’t getting what he wanted and became increasingly agitated with me. When the threats started, I Googled the name of the software I downloaded (AnyDesk) on my phone and realized I was being scammed. The threats escalated to physical as well as to ruin me digitally so I hung up and called the police.
While I was waiting for the police to come, I pulled the plug on my router and used my phone to change my password for my AppleID and began changing every password for all of my financial websites. After the police took my report and reassured me that the physical threats were likely just to scare me, I called Xfinity and got my IP address changed. Incidentally, my router is so old that they are sending me a new, more secure router to install.
I also filed a report with the FTC on their scam site. It likely won’t help anything but at least I reported the phone number that the call came from.
Yesterday, I spent quality time at the Genius Bar at my local Apple store where they checked my computer for malware. I had deleted the AnyDesk software, but wanted someone else to take a look as well. And changing my AppleID password weirded out my iPhone so they fixed the issue with that while I was there.
I’m checking all my financial information at least once a day but I really believe that the 2 factor authorization I have on almost all my accounts is what saved me from what could have been a disaster. So the moral to my cautionary tale? Given the right circumstances, we are ALL vulnerable to scammers and hackers. They have gotten increasingly sophisticated and can really make you buy into their lies. So make sure you question things that seem weird, are using strong passwords, and that you use 2 factor or biometric authorizations for extra security.
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