WTF moment left me speechless



  • I work in IT for a large branch of the government for a country that passes its living as america's hat.

    Today my phone rang, and it was an IT support agent who was going to configure my pc for web office so I could access my workstation from home. He asked for two things : My email client password and my login name / password.

    I asked him if he would like me to email them to him, he told me "No, its actually more secure if you just say it over the phone". Apparently the email is all plaintext, and anyone (i mean anyone) can search through ALL the emails written by ANYONE ELSE to find a search string. Ie "Login name" or "Password".

    I didnt know what to say when presented with the excellent security feature. Wait, yes I did. WTF?



  •  The WTF isn't the e-mail system here directly it's that you were asked to supply your password in the first place.

     



  • The whole situation sounds fishy to me!



  • Can you say social engineering?



  •  Agreed on the fishiness.  I think the proper response is to tell the IT guy (if that's really who he is) to reset your password, make the changes, and then call you with the new password which you then promptly change.



  • You never ever tell your login OR password over the phone or over email. Ever. There are no exceptions. 



  • similarly, Orange used to call me and ask for my security code.

     No.. you cant have it



  • In other news, I have a money saving opportunity for all of you involving debt consolidation, but you have to PM me with your social security number to take advantage. 


  • Garbage Person

    @belgariontheking said:

    In other news, I have a money saving opportunity for all of you involving debt consolidation, but you have to PM me with your social security number to take advantage. 

    Because it makes so much sense to steal the identity of someone who's already in crappiles of debt (and thus has something worth consolidating)



  • @Weng said:

    Because it makes so much sense to steal the identity of someone who's already in crappiles of debt (and thus has something worth consolidating)
    Fair enough.  I was just mimicking a call that I got once from "some asshole."  He claimed to be able to consolidate my debt (I only have a single student loan) but he wanted my social security number.  I don't know how long he listened to me cussing him out before he hung up.


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