The awful, fast-growing tech scams fleecing the elderly out of millions

The U.S. attorney general has vowed an “all-out attack” on elderly internet fraud, but experts say the crackdown is more like a game of whack-a-mole.

The phone rings, and the person on the line claims to be calling from a trustworthy tech company like Microsoft or Apple. There’s a problem with your computer, he says–perhaps it’s infected with viruses or infiltrated by hackers–but he’s happy to work with you to clean things up for a fee.

If you ever get such a call, it’s a scam, and experts say you should simply hang up. Tech companies simply won’t call you to offer services to fix your computer, nor will they pop up messages in your web browser offering help eradicating malware or a digital tune-up.

But in 2018 alone, people reported losing $55 million to tech support scams, according to the Federal Trade Commission (FTC), and people age 60 and older were about five times more likely to report losing money to such fraudsters. Such scams are now considered among the fastest growing internet-based frauds, according to the FBI, which reported a 161% increase in victims’ monetary losses over 2017.

And those are just the victims who reported the fraud to the FTC, the FBI, and partner organizations: It’s likely many targeted by scams didn’t report out of embarrassment, quietly reversed fraudulent charges with their credit card companies, or have yet to realize they’ve been defrauded.

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Solving the Top Issues MSP IT Support Teams Face

For an MSP, choosing the right technical partner can enhance your success and improve business continuity.

It’s easy to lose sight of how big and agonizing a decision it is for organizations when selecting a managed service provider. It’s one of the most profound choices that a modern business will make as it hands management and security of IT networks and systems to a third party. So, as an MSP yourself, how do you inspire confidence in potential clients and maintain the trust of your existing ones? In an already crowded market, the answer has to be excellent customer service backed by bulletproof IT system reliability — the very things that your own clients strive for, and the exact reason they turn to you for support. It also means selecting a technical partner that is able to enhance your offering and understands your long-term business goals. One you can depend on in the same way your clients rely on you.

But MSPs often struggle in exactly the same ways as their clients when it comes to choosing the right solutions partner, and as a result, their IT teams face the same uphill struggle when prioritizing support-related queries and coping with day-to-day systems management. This article looks at a few of the most common day-to-day challenges encountered by IT teams within MSPs and explores some potential solutions.


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IT Support Basics: Back to the Basics in IT Support

IT support is a business function of all IT Departments, which ensures that the computer systems of that company are monitored and maintained. This could either be done by an internal IT Department or a third party managed service provider. An IT support managed service provider ensures that the networks of a business are operating according to the standards of the company.

The basic functions of an IT support team are:

• Installing computer software
• Configuring systems
• Monitoring systems to ensure that run as they should
• Maintaining networks and systems
• Replace parts
• Troubleshoot systems
• Diagnose problems and solve them
• Provide technical support and advice
• Set up user accounts
• Test, evaluate and upgrade systems to new technology
• Conduct safety checks

The above list is indicates just some of the services to expect from your IT support team. Frequently, companies do not have the bandwidth or resources to support all of their IT needs. As a result they will seek to outsource some or all of their responsibilities to an IT service provider. Traditionally, a contracted IT company in Boston will simply work when needed - clients will contact the vendor to perform necessary maintenance, including system updates, hardware repair, security checks, etc. With the help of the service provider, IT services can be made proactive instead of reactive. 

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