Scambaiting is not something everyone wants to do (not even me); nor is it something everyone wants to watch.  But when a Technical Support scammer called me, late in the day, right when I was not in the mood for more lies… I felt a responsibility to waste this guy’s time so that he couldn’t instead be stealing from others.

This happened long before I even considered starting a YouTube channel. I don’t have any special computer skills, or a Virtual Machine, so I wasn’t going to take any risks. However, I had seen some scambaiting videos on YouTube, and thought it would be fun to try this instead of just calling him out straight away.

I looked terrible: tired and messy – but it’s real life, so I’m not embarrassed about how ordinary this video is. It was otherwise such convenient timing. How lucky to get such a classic cold call on an evening with nothing else to do! And how lucky that he called at a time that was so convenient to pull out a video camera and settle in to see how long I could keep him busy.

Anyhoo, this is the video of my adventure into the world of hampering a Tech Support criminal. If you want to watch, grab a snack and settle in, because it’s about 53 minutes long.

IMPORTANT: NEVER FOLLOW THE SCAMMER’S INSTRUCTIONS. I did NOT actually type any of his instructions into the boxes he told me to use. Instead, I looked up the key words in Google Images so that I could figure out something to say when he asked what was on my screen…

This particular scammer played a very standard script. Information about how these scams work, and what you can do if you are affected, is in the following Lifewire article: How to recognize tech support scams and protect yourself.

If you have your own story about a tech support scam, please let me know in the comments.  The more we talk openly about this, the less likely others will fall victim!

Stay safe,
Kerri