Having spent couple of weeks in Sydney, I once happened to pick up a telephone call where the caller identified himself as a representative of the 'Windows technical team' and took great effort in explaining how they had identified that my computer was infected by virus and malware. Ofcourse, I just having arrived in Sydney with my own laptop found this call extremely amusing. Indeed, I was suspicious the very moment, the caller claimed to be representing the 'Windows technical team', Microsoft does not make calls across the world to homes about virus and malware! Nevertheless, continued to query the caller after listening to him (for almost 3 minutes on the supposed viruses and malware on my PC and how they provide services to clean it up).
Me : "How do you know that my PC contains virus and malware"
Caller : "Ma'am, we are doing a research around your area and it has been identified"
I managed to control my bursting laughter at his answer, I shall not even attempt to interpret the meaning of his answer. Based on the sub-continent accented English I figured where the call was originating from, unfortunately, they are able to make international calls across continents and convince people to lose their money and sensitive information such as credit card and bank account details.
The ultimate aim of the caller, is to make you turn on your PC, and carry out some instructions they tell you which eventually would give them access to your PC or convince you to provide them credit card/bank details, under the cover of "we will clean the virus and malware and restore your computer system safely" for a minimal fee.
Back to the telephone conversation, I just popped a silly question.
Me : Could you tell me the IP address of my PC please?
Caller : Hung up!