Latest news with #techsupportscams
Forbes
23-05-2025
- Forbes
Do Not Call These Numbers On Your iPhone, Android Phone
Never make these calls. You have been warned. This threat is now surging and has more than doubled in 2025. Google and Microsoft have updated their platforms to better protect users, but it has not yet stopped this plague of attacks. The FBI has issued multiple warnings for users to avoid the simple mistake that could see data, money, even identifies stolen. The latest warning comes from Guardio's security team, which says it has now 'spotted a 137% surge in tech support scams between November 2024 and April 2025. According to our data, these dangerous scams have more than doubled over the past few months.' Such scams are not new — cybercriminals reach out to victims to fix made-up issues with PCs or phones. What is new is 'a spike closely tied to scammers using AI tools to scale their operations, allowing them to create convincing scams at scale.' That surge is one new AI risk. The other is that such scams are now 'more convincing, personal, and far more effective, catching more people off guard. These scams lead to significant financial losses, and the money usually can't be recovered.' Guardio found that whatever the lure — a frozen browser, a popup, an alert — the likely attack will push users to make a phone call. A 1-888 number to reach back directly to Microsoft or Google or Apple support. There the victim will be convinced to install software or provide direct access to their provide personal or financial information. As ever with phone scams, remember this is what they do for a living and they do it well. Tech support scams have been making headlines in recent weeks with Google highlighting the risks and updating its platforms to help users flag them in real time. Do not call these numbers. 'Tech support scams are an increasingly prevalent form of cybercrime,' Google warns, 'aimed at extorting money or gaining unauthorized access to sensitive data… Tech support scams on the web often employ alarming pop-up warnings mimicking legitimate security alerts. We've also observed them to use full-screen takeovers and disable keyboard and mouse input to create a sense of crisis.' Google has updated its Safe Browsing with on-device analysis to monitor signals that might flag this type of attack in real time. 'If Safe Browsing determines that the page is likely to be a scam,' Google says, 'Chrome will show a warning.' The company is also updating Android. 'Our research shows that phone scammers often try to trick people into performing specific actions to initiate a scam, like changing default device security settings or granting elevated permissions to an app. These actions can result in spying, fraud, and other abuse by giving an attacker deeper access to your device and data. To combat phone scammers, we're working to block specific actions and warn you of these sophisticated attempts.' Google warns users it doesn't call or proactively reach out to users to resolve technical or account issues. Never. Microsoft echoes these warnings. 'Tech support scams are an industry-wide issue… If you allow them to remote into your computer to perform a 'fix,' they will often install malware, ransomware, or other unwanted programs that can steal your information or damage your data or device.' Critically, Microsoft warns users that its error and warning messages 'never include phone numbers.' Never. Meanwhile, the surge continues. 'We think the huge rise in tech support scams we're seeing is really concerning and worth highlighting,' Guardio told me.
Phone Arena
09-05-2025
- Phone Arena
Google just gave Chrome and Android a secret weapon against online scams
If you've ever had one of those scary pop-up windows claiming your phone or computer has a virus, you're definitely not alone. Fake virus alerts and tech support scams are still everywhere – and now Google is stepping things up to fight them using AI that runs directly on your device. The company says it is using Gemini Nano, a lightweight version of its Gemini AI model, to help spot scammy websites and pop-ups in real-time. This protection is rolling out to users with Enhanced Protection in Chrome on desktop and the best part is that it doesn't rely on cloud processing – it happens on your machine. – Google, May 2025 But Google isn't stopping with desktop. It also plans to roll out this AI-powered scam protection to Android devices – starting with smarter alerts in Chrome. If a suspicious website sends a sketchy push notification, Google will flag it, give you the option to unsubscribe or let you view it anyway if you think it is safe. Google is launching new AI-powered warnings for Chrome on Android. | Image credit – Google These notifications are end-to-end encrypted and the analysis is done completely on your device. Google doesn't get to see the content. Since notifications can be sensitive, Google trained its model using synthetic data generated by Gemini, rather than scraping real are now using AI to crank out tons of fake, realistic-looking content, making it way easier for them to trick people and steal personal info or money. The barrier to entry for online scams has basically disappeared – and that's a serious problem. To push back, Google also recently rolled out AI-powered scam detection directly on Android phones. It is built right into Google Messages and the Phone by Google app, and it is designed to catch these more advanced scams before they get to you. But, let's be real – scammers aren't going to stop anytime soon. They are constantly switching up their tactics. But at least Google is making it harder for them to succeed and that is always a win.
