If you ever get a random phone call where they tell you that they are from “Telstra”, and there is a problem with your Internet Connection; Question Everything!

I’ve now had 5+ of these style of calls in the last week, and I’ve had a bit of fun with them. But at the same time, I could imagine that there are people that could easily fall for this sort of scam.

Things you can ask them:

• How did you get my number?
  • My mobile number is not associated with the Internet account that we use, so there is no reason that they should be calling me directly.
• I don’t use Telstra for my internet, so why are you calling?
  • If they say that Telstra is the major ISP for Australia, and all connections go through them, this isn’t true, and they are trying to try and provide information that sort of sounds like it could be true to convince you that they are legitimate.
• Ask for proof that there is an issue.
  • If they were legitimate, they should be able to provide you with some details before you even need to access anything on your own computer.
• Ask for a reference number so that you can call Telstra up to confirm the issue.
  • Remember, if there is an actual issue, you will be able to find out this information from Telstra directly using their Customer Service on 13 22 00 or by going to https://outages.telstra.com.au/

At no time should you need to access your own computer to check if there is an issue.

I can’t say where this scam goes, as they have never kept me on the phone long enough to find out. Everytime they have hung up on me when they have realised that they will not be able to scam me. And that includes one time where I was on the phone for 7 minutes and I was asking the person on the other end what it was that they were trying to scam me out of.

Do not forget that you can always Hang Up on them. It’s not rude. They are trying to scam you.