00253820308

Just had a call from an Indian woman claiming I had problem with malware on my computer and that she wanted to help me fix it. As I work in IT I knew she was talking rubbish and told her so. What amazed me was her tenacity, insisting that she knew I had a problem and could I turn my computer on. I went on to discuss the fact that I had antivirus/malware and I would be aware of any problem. Finally in an attempt to indicate she knew nothing, I insisted that she must know my ip address at the very least to prove her credibilty. She hung up.

They called us claiming they were from Microsoft and my PC had virusses, as soon as I told them that it doesn't sound legit and I would call the police, they hung up.

Just got a call from this number. They said they were from Micro Assist and had received error reports from our computer (Micro Assist is alegitimate US based company in Austin Texas). My wife was suspicious and made them call me. They said they were calling from the UK  - although the number is clearly not a UK number. They then said the number shows as if it was from the US - although 002 in not the US code - from California. They said their address in the Uk was 146 Banbury Road, Oxford. The person said his name was Albert Martin, although he clearly had an Asian accent. They said we had hacking software on the computer and that they wanted to help clear it up. My wife said the man had tried to get her to open a window in the computer and enter a code. She did not do this - and it made her more suspicious. This code would have given them remote access.

Getting calls from this number about viruses! Rang back to see if I could tell them to stop. Had a french voice saying the number is out of service.

Just 2 minutes ago I got called ( in Holland ) from this number 00253820308. The man said that my computersystem had problems. When I said nothing was wrong he hang up without saying anything.
Wants to fish after personal numbers or so. Stop this man!!!!

number called 00253820308
please block it

I am now receiving up to 35 calls a day from these b-----ds!!! My dog has actually started to howl evey time the phone rings - something he has never done in all the 9 years we have had him! I have now stopped answering the phone when their number comes up, The sound of the phone ringing constantly is exceedingly annoying. I have spoken to the national phone company who supplies our phone service and the police, it seems there is nothing they can do about it. All they can suggest is that we change our telephone number, which is a real hassle, it means changing that info with a lot of people!

This number rang at 8.20am this morning.  I didn't answer as I was suspicious of the number.  We have had many scam calls over the last 2 years with scammers claiming to be from Microsoft. Often, I have had to get very rude!!

Mostly now we don't answer if ID number is not familiar.  You always suspect a scammer when voicemail is never left by them!!

I received a call from this number today ( 14/11/2011) just now. I didn't answer but just wrote down the number and searched on internet.

I guess there are the same company that called me a couple of months ago. A man with a strange accent (it was difficult to understand) and kinda poor english started the conversation by claiming that my computer was about to crash and I should follow his instructions immediately.

The scam was quite obvious as:

- He only said he is from Microsoft and he was calling all "microsoft customers" which is too vague. He wasn't able to provide more information and kept on repeating "I'm from Microsoft and your computer is about to crash".
- If you can *see* my "computer", you surely know what type of computer is and OS I'm using. He wasn't able to answer that nor what kind of problem it was and what components it was going to affect.
- He was adamant on "if you don't do this, your computer will crash NOW". Which, after 3 times he repeated it, started sounding funny.

The call provides no information about you at all, keeps on blatering about "microsoft customer" and THING shutting down PC. Completely unable to provide more tech details or basic explanation of the problem ("your computer will crash" is not an explanation for me). If you'll tell obvious lie (" Don't tell me this is going to burn my chipset!!!I don't want this to happen!") they'll  confirm it. :P  Even if you're saying a complete nonsense , as they just want you to sit in front on the PC and do what they want.

Again, Ireland.

Received call from this number same old jargon virus repair service,is ther any way to prevent these calls?

That's a good response! I'm gonna use it when they call me back. We just get called by those weirdo's..

Haha totally agree. Exaclty the same happened to me half an hour ago... I asked for a Dutch person, but the only Dutch person was 'busy' and couldn't call me back later? He answered that he was calling from Holland, but kindaaa strange there was only one Dutch person. Well, I hope they won't call us again.

I live in Holland and I've got a phonecall from Ben Watson from Microsoft with the same phonenumber 00253820308. I asked his phonenumber to call him back but I got a wrong to long dutch phonenumber but I didn't say anything about it. When I hang up  I googled this number and saw on your site whocallsme.com that the number is from a hacker. I called also Microsoft in Holland and Microsoft will never phone or mail us about virusses or anything about your computer.

Got a call from this number...long story about virusses and junk files apparently creating problems with Microsoft operating system... I asked if it was Malware and what type... at which point the lady said she will transfer me to the Microsoft technical department for them to help me remove it... The so called technical guy asked a lot of leading questions about virus software and whether it was licensed and what product used... I didnt supply correct info and asked for relevance at this stage? I also got bored and asked them if they like wasting money - where were they calling from - I asked amused... India (strong accent sounding like an Indian person speaking English)... the accent then changed to American? My wife and I were amused, but also very alarmed - he recited my home address and telephone number... we do try and be very careful about our privacy... so how is this possible? Who are these people?? Does anyone know?

Neither Microsoft, nor its partners,will ever 'phone you.  It would be a breach of their privacy rules. This scam was on BBC1, 21st November, on a programme called "You've been Scammed".  These people try to get remote access to the computer and will install spyware/malware.  Any money they ask for to "fix" nonexistent faults seems to be a diversion to hide what they are really doing.  They only ask for money after they have got the access.

Just got a call -again- from this crew- kept them talking for ages acting like I was confused, eg yes my computer is on the top of the desk when they asked me was it a laptop or desk top, and yes I was looking out my windows etc.
He said he was phoning from New York. Eventually he got fed up and hung up.

Same old line about your computer has a virus from 00253820308
Previous calls today from 00223 and 00103 and 00371661065

Are they all related ?

Who is going to put a stop to these callers? Luckily my phone has a number recording mode and I don't pick up when I see the number come up. They pretend to call from microsoft.

I got also a call from this number and they said i had a lot of virus in my computer and that i had to buy a firewall program from microsoft for 200 euro and i had to go trough western union but finally i did not give western union my id-card or passport number or phone them back to give them the autority to collect the money because my it-friend told me about this number so i was just on time to protect myself so watch out for these guys

Got a call this morning in Ireland from "Windows Computer" about hidden vulnerabilities in windows. Asian man, think he called himself John, or else he knew my name. Did not have time to engage him long enough to see where he was going with it. It was obviously a scam...I like the idea of stringing them along for as long as possible.