2646 days ago

ANOTHER PHONE SCAM ALERT! PHONE SCAM ALERT!

Matt from Henderson

Hi everyone. Matt here. There has just been another phone scam that just happened at our house today (Saturday 17 November). There was a man (my mum got the phone, not me), claiming that he was from Spark saying that our own WIFI Broadband was getting hacked into. Apparently thank goodness my mum did not give the person any other details apart from this info. Her laptop is a school laptop and runs Mac software not Windows. Anyways, the person on the phone was saying that she needed to go to Teamviewer, (a typical scammers way for them to access your computer) and type in a password for them to access my mum's laptop (well her school's laptop). She didn't know that password, thank goodness for that.

Apparently the person is going to ring back here on Tuesday at 5.30pm at our house.

I had told my mum that this person claiming to be a Spark caller or technician is a scammer. Spark (previously Telecom) or any other company would not ring you saying that your WIFI broadband is getting hacked into or wanting to access your computer.

So she rung up Spark the local Auckland number to see if they had rung our house and to see if our WIFI broadband was getting hacked into or if it was another scammer.

She also looked at the Spark Website. She did read that Spark would not provide credit card or passwords

This is what the Spark website says. I'll give you both the link and the info underlined.

www.spark.co.nz...

Phone Scams

There are many different types of phone scams. There are a range of strategies a scammer uses to trick the person, including number spoofing. This is where a scammer disguises the original caller ID with a number they choose. For example, a call may look like it's from a local NZ number but is actually coming from overseas.

You can see a list of verified phone scams on the current scams page. See current scams

Characteristics of a phone scam

It’s a cold call you weren’t expecting. The caller claims they've identified a problem in your modem or computer. Or that your WiFi has been hacked or is running slow due to a recent Fibre install or virus. They offer to help by taking control of your computer through Team Viewer.
Note: Spark does not call customers unexpectedly to say they have a virus on their computer or modem
If the person is suspicious, they often provide a New Zealand number for the person to call back on. This number belongs to the scammers and they answer the call "Hello, Spark help desk".
The scammer claims to be from Spark’s help desk and offer their Spark staff number to prove they are an employee. They even offer to give you details of their manager to call.
They may know your full name, address and birthday. They can find this information through research online or buy it on the black market. You shouldn't assume they're legitimate for knowing these details.
The scammers call from an international call centre with a large number of staff. Scam calls are often very noisy in the background.

This is a so called scam like those Microsoft scammers who call you to want to fix your computer and bank scammers as well. Mind you our house has not had any of these but I personally get a lot of the "phishing" emails on my other email. "Phishing" email are just basically emails for example if any of you get these, this is just for example:

Subject: ASB Bank

Were waiting for you bank account to be activated. Please the link below to this. Obviously you click the link in the email.

I don't a link, but giving this one just as an example of what you people might get in any of your emails.

If you do click on a link that the so called email does provide, it will just end up taking you to the real bank website whatever bank you are with.

If any of you do receive any bank emails like this just delete these.

I hope that whoever reads this will get more understanding with scammers.

Matt

More messages from your neighbours
3 days ago

A Neighbourly Riddle! Don’t Overthink It… Or Do?😜

The Riddler from The Neighbourly Riddler

Do you think you know the answer? Simply 'Like' this post if you know the answer and the big reveal will be posted in the comments at 2pm on the day!

If you multiply this number by any other number, the answer will always be the same. What number is this?

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2 days ago

Poll: Should the government levy industries that contribute to financial hardship?

The Team from Neighbourly.co.nz

As reported in the Post, there’s a $30 million funding gap in financial mentoring. This has led to services closing and mentors stepping in unpaid just to keep helping people in need 🪙💰🪙

One proposed solution? Small levies on industries that profit from financial hardship — like banks, casinos, and similar companies.

So we want to hear what you think:
Should the government ask these industries to contribute?

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Should the government levy industries that contribute to financial hardship?
  • 58.9% Yes, supporting people is important!
    58.9% Complete
  • 25.1% No, individuals should take responsibility
    25.1% Complete
  • 16% ... It is complicated
    16% Complete
538 votes
10 days ago

Even Australians get it - so why not Kiwis???

Markus from Green Bay

“Ten years ago, if a heatwave as intense as last week’s record-breaker had hit the east coast, Australia’s power supply may well have buckled. But this time, the system largely operated as we needed, despite some outages.

On Australia’s main grid last quarter, renewables and energy storage contributed more than 50% of supplied electricity for the first time, while wholesale power prices were more than 40% lower than a year earlier.

[…] shifting demand from gas and coal for power and petrol for cars is likely to deliver significantly lower energy bills for households.

Last quarter, wind generation was up almost 30%, grid solar 15% and grid-scale batteries almost tripled their output. Gas generation fell 27% to its lowest level for a quarter century, while coal fell 4.6% to its lowest quarterly level ever.

Gas has long been the most expensive way to produce power. Gas peaking plants tend to fire up only when supply struggles to meet demand and power prices soar. Less demand for gas has flowed through to lower wholesale prices.”

Full article: www.theguardian.com...


If even Australians see the benefit of solar - then why is NZ actively boycotting solar uptake? The increased line rental for electricity was done to make solar less competitive and prevent cost per kWh to rise even more than it did - and electricity costs are expected to rise even more. Especially as National favours gas - which is the most expensive form of generating electricity. Which in turn will accelerate Climate Change, as if New Zealand didn’t have enough problems with droughts, floods, slips, etc. already.