There are variations of this scam, but the principal is the same. You would get a message stating that a reputable company owes you money. You just have to call this number, and get the refund. You call the scammer call center, and they will direct you to download a piece of software so they can have shared control of your computer. They will open Notepad, or the command prompt panel, and do some techno magicry to make you think you are connected to their system. They will then have you type in some information with one of them being the amount, let’s say $300. They will also want you to have pen and paper handy. You would then go to your bank’s website where you would log in, and they will tell you to note how much is in your account which is important for the scam. They will tell you that your screen will go black while the refund is processing. When the screen comes back on, you would see more than your $300 refund deposited, let’s say $1,300 deposit. They will then have you look at the notepad or command prompt to see how much “you” entered. It would show the amount “deposited”, and of course this is your fault, and they are going to lose their job unless it is remedied immediately. You will have to get gift cards to satisfy the mistake. If you didn’t have $1,000 in your account before the “deposit”, they will tell you that you have to use a credit card or cash as the deposit hasn’t taken completely effective just yet (since you had less than $1,000). You get the gift cards, and you give them the numbers.
You did NOT get any money. When your screen went black, they changed the HTML code to show the extra “amount” in your bank account. They also edited the command prompt or notepad. You screen has to go black so you don’t see them doing this. Here is the thing, Microsoft or “insert company name here” will never need to see your bank account information to make a deposit. Your screen will never need to go black, and Microsoft will not need to have you open a command prompt or notepad. Just like any electronic deposit, it just happens without all of the crazy hoop jumping you would have to do to play with this scam. To not be a victim of this scam, start with not downloading any software they tell you to download. You do NOT need to do this to get any refund.