[pwd72s]

(edit: This a 2 days saga) Cindy fell for a phone scammer. Since we'd been dealing with Xfinity lately, poor Cindy thought a scammer really was calling from Xfinity, let the scammer into our computer and actually gave her our bank account number! Since our dealing was a rate reduction, Cindy believed the scammer wanted to deposit an "overcharge". Gawd! Lucky I returned from the barbershop in time to see what was happening, killed the power to the 'puter. Next immediate move was to rush to the bank, where a kindly officer lady closed our old account, gave us a new one. Anyway, a general mess to clean up...including on the 'puter. I think we dodged a bullet.

Anyway, looking like we lucked out..dodged a bullet. Credit cards are okay. Probably because I'm a silly old technophobe who has never given a card number on the net, and won't do paypal. Anyway, only 2 credit cards, they both aware of what happened. We do have a debit card, but Cindy only uses it at our local issuing bank. It's been closed, a new one being issued. The only accounts on our 'puter are with Vanguard securities and with the US Treasury bank, where we hold some bonds. According to our computer programmer neighbor, even Russian or Chinese hackers would have a hard time trying to enter those systems...not to worry.

This neighbor was our savior! He spent 6-7 hours on the cleanup...using his spare hard drive, on the phone with a service, etc. Generally speaking, everything on our 'puter was removed, every program "cleaned"", and the portal to enter created by the hacker was removed. See the benefits gained from letting him have the firewood from some dead trees here? I figure this kindly act was worth much more than the 4, maybe 5 cords of wood.

Cindy still has some penance to pay by contacting direct payment folks to inform them of our new bank account number. Hope those go better than Social Security...with the 'puter still at risk, had to use the phone. Would you believe over 3 hours on hold? Made the 50 minutes on hold with a credit card company a piece of cake.

A bitter lesson well learned...I'm as sure as I can be that Cindy won't do that again. Never...never ever assume a caller is who he or she says they are. If they claim to be from XYZ corporation, even if you think it's legit, hang up, then call XYZ Corporation directly. NEVER give any personal information to a cold caller.

Also plan on getting a good restaurant gift certificate for our neighbor...he wouldn't take money.