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lnerenbu
Contributor III
Message 1 of 10

Site Advisor help site wants to remotely control my computer

After a strange incident I was looking at a Google search on McAfee site advisor and at the top of the list were sites with 888 phone numbers (888-262-0480). I called two different numbers and was connected to men with British accents who, after a few questions, wanted to take remote control of my computer.   Both people were just too quick to ask for control.

That wasn't going to happen and I quickly got off.

Is anyone familiar with these sites? 

The site was McAfee.vsupport24.com/siteadvisor.  McAfee's site advisor gives them a green check mark although no the McAfee secure icon.

9 Replies
SafeBoot
MVP
MVP
Message 2 of 10

Re: Site Advisor help site wants to remotely control my computer

It's a new site, If the company is genuine, it specializes in paid-for support. They are not related to McAfee at all, if you do a google search for vsupport24.com you'll see they support everything.

I did a quick search for registered companies called "vsupport" in the UK, USA and Australia, but didn't find anything - they could be registered under a different name though. It is odd they don't mention their location or official company designation on their web site (or domain registration) though.

Their disclaimer is

"Disclaimer: vsupport24.com is an independent tech support company and is not affiliated with Microsoft, HP, Canon, Dell, Epson, Apple, Kaspersky, McAfee, Norton, Facebook, Acer, Lenovo, QuickBooks/Intuit, IncrediMail, Hotmail, AOL, Avsast, AVG, Gmail and Yahoo."

I expect it's just an energetic young company realizing they can do telephone support with remote control cheaply over the interent, though there was a recent case in the UK where a guy set up exactly the scam you are worried about.

Without real reviews and feedback (which I could not find doing a simple search) we don't know how geniune the service is, so approach with caution.

http://www.tradingstandards.gov.uk/extra/news-item.cfm/newsid/1456

NOTE - this issue intrigued me, I reached out to them via Email asking for their official company details, I'll let you know if they respond.

Message was edited by: SafeBoot on 4/1/14 8:50:49 AM EDT
SafeBoot
MVP
MVP
Message 3 of 10

Re: Site Advisor help site wants to remotely control my computer

The plot thickens - I found this in their T&C

HERE UNDER MENTIONED TERMS AND CONDITIONS STATE IMPORTANT REQUIREMENTS REGARDING CUSTOMER’S USE OFVSupport24 WEBSITE “www.mcafee-help.com” IS AN ASSOCIATE OF VSupport24, VSupport24 SERVICES AND CUSTOMERS RELATIONSHIP WITH“VSupport24” AND “VSupport24 LLC”

and

United States Law governs these terms and conditions and Customer agree to submit to the exclusive jurisdiction of the United States courts.

from http://vsupport24.com/terms-conditions.html

which would seem to indicate this is a USA operation.

Mcafee-help.com is a typo-ridden site, but it's T&C points you towards a company called "Security Experts LLC", and again quotes USA law

http://mcafee-help.com/terms-conditions.html

Now I could not find VSupport24 or "Security Experts LLC" in Hoovers but I did find an entry (perhaps unrelated) for "VSupport LLC" in TX.

http://www.manta.com/c/mr4ckdw/v-support-llc

The fact the company registration is so hard to find indicates it's either a feisty startup who forgot that step, or perhaps, not what it seems.


SafeBoot
MVP
MVP
Message 4 of 10

Re: Site Advisor help site wants to remotely control my computer

looking deeper at http://mcafee-help.com, it uses the same graphics and style from http://techmaster.mcafee.com

lnerenbu
Contributor III
Message 5 of 10

Re: Site Advisor help site wants to remotely control my computer

Their behavior was very suspicious.  The website does attempt to look like official McAfee despite the disclaimer.

On the first call I made to them the representative, after I described my problem, said he'd consult with a 'level 3' person or something like that and, almost immediately without putting me on hold, said they would have to remotely take control of my computer.  I said "that's not happening" and hung up. 

I called another number for site advisor help that came up in the google search, very similar to the first number, and again the agent (a different one but also with a British accent) all too quickly wanted to remotely control my computer.  I politely declined this time with 'I will restore a backup copy' and we parted nicely.

What struck me as odd was that there was no mention of the cost of their 'help'.    

SafeBoot
MVP
MVP
Message 6 of 10

Re: Site Advisor help site wants to remotely control my computer

I hate to ask - but are you sure they were British and not Australian? https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DB824JcSNJ0

All their domain registration seems to be in Australia but anything's possible.

Looking at their sister site "mcafee-help.com" it has problems, possibly malware - http://sitecheck3.sucuri.net/results/mcafee-help.com

Good call Len bringing it up here. If you want McAfee (paid) help for pretty much anything, the site is http://techmaster.mcafee.com

Free support for McAfee products is via http://service.mcafee.com/

exbrit
MVP
MVP
Message 7 of 10

Re: Site Advisor help site wants to remotely control my computer

The motto is check your sources before calling.   Never click ads unless you know and trust the product and if you find that Google Search is linking to bad ones, I believe they have a reporting mechanism for that.

There are dozens of fly-by-night so-called "Official" McAfee help sites.   Safeboot I'm sure McAfee's legal department is well acquainted with the problem.

There are even ones that will phone you out of the blue and swear that they ARE McAfee or Microsoft or whomever and that unless you immediately allow them full access to your computer (and your bank account) the world will end or some-such bizarre story........hang up immediately and if your phone line has Call Screen, block them from calling again.

There are NO openly published and advertised phone numbers for McAfee Support, however you can obtain phone (or online chat) support by following some basic steps through the links under Useful Links (or McAfee Support) at the top of this page or by right-clicking your taskbar icon and selecting Help and following the prompts.

.

Message was edited by: Ex_Brit on 01/04/14 12:37:47 EDT PM
exbrit
MVP
MVP
Message 8 of 10

Re: Site Advisor help site wants to remotely control my computer

Moved this to SiteAdvisor to see if anyone there may have comments.

lnerenbu
Contributor III
Message 9 of 10

Re: Site Advisor help site wants to remotely control my computer

Yes it could have been Australian and, based on the domain registration, probably was.  I'm no expert on either accent.

Hayton
Reliable Contributor
Reliable Contributor
Message 10 of 10

Re: Site Advisor help site wants to remotely control my computer

The URL "McAfee.vsupport24.com/siteadvisor" brings up a 404 page :

The server can not find the requested page:

/siteadvisor (port 80)

Please forward this error screen to mcafee.vsupport24.com's WebMaster.

vsupport24.com was first registered a year ago. Registration was through Crazy Domains, "Private Registration" in Sydney Australia. Their server IP address shows it is located in Australia (somewhere in the outback, apparently) and hosts another 990 websites. So we're looking at a really cheap setup.

http://whois.domaintools.com/vsupport24.com

http://www.tcpiputils.com/browse/ip-address/116.0.23.242

The main website looks nothing at all like any McAfee site - I haven't yet checked the other site that Safeboot referred to.

Their "Why work with us"  page proclaims

VSupport24, is an independent provider of On-Demand Tech Support for PCs, software and other connected devices

so it's a general-purpose tech support site. It has no official backing from or affiliation to any of the software companies (including Microsoft and McAfee).

Disclaimer: vsupport24.com is an independent tech support company and is not affiliated with Microsoft, HP, Canon, Dell, Epson, Apple, Kaspersky, McAfee, Norton, Facebook, Acer, Lenovo, QuickBooks/Intuit, IncrediMail, Hotmail, AOL, Avsast, AVG, Gmail and Yahoo.

Whoever provided the website content obviously struggled with the English language - "garbled" hardly begins to describe it. And there's a big red warning sign, right there. If they were any good they would have hired professionals to make the site content at least coherent. As it is the site looks pretty amateur.

The site gets its high ranking in Google searches either by paying to be placed at the top of the list or by using SEO techniques to manipulate their placing in search results (and if they overdo it Google will notice and slap them down).

I can't see anything on the site that says how much they charge but you can bet it won't be cheap. And if they remote into your machine then boy, you'd better trust them absolutely not to mess things up (deliberately or otherwise) or leave backdoors on your system so they can come back later.

If anyone encounters these people or anyone like them and has any doubts they should do as the poster did, and just walk away.

Out of curiosity I checked both WOT and SiteAdvisor for user reviews. No-one has posted a review, and WOT hasn't rated them. That means it's a very low-traffic site.

Message was edited by: Hayton on 02/04/14 03:49:19 IST
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