Do calls like that happen? Unfortunately, yes.
Is it a reason to lock down and enshittify every computing platform, every OS, every Internet-connected device until we own nothing, control nothing and can’t install what we please?
It’s an age old tactic of manipulation to start with something true, exaggerate the threat, and apply it everywhere possible.
SreudianFlip@sh.itjust.works 1 day ago
Yeah for sure. I have to deal with a lot of tech-support and similar scam victims, and I always wind up explaining that this con is as old as civilization at least, it’s just the location and props that are new.
Lure you in with a benefit or problem solved, ensure that you get lost or disoriented, manufacture fear/uncertainty/doubt, offer a way out, trap is set.
Once upon a time I had someone try to run this same scam on me in meatspace, a big ancient city. Offer a solution to a logistics problem, get me lost in the maze, create new problem of changed conditions, intimidate with new people arriving, and pressure with intense sales tactics on a bullshit product. I wasn’t actually lost so just walked away, curiosity satisfied, but some people would have lost a lot of money.