"Got [a call] tonight," said a reader in an email of Oct. 3, the day the FTC announced its moves against over two-dozen companies and individuals, but more than a week after a federal judge issued restraining orders against the accused. "Guy could hardly speak English and it was definitely a large call center. I told him I knew it was a scam and then said a few 'choice' words."

Another reader, Lynda Owens, related a Sept. 24 call she received.

"The gentleman on the other end was trying to tell me that my computer was sending out codes through my Microsoft [Windows] alerting them that I was having issues," Owens wrote in an email. "I started questioning him pretty hard and wanted him to identify himself and the company that he was with. After about 10 minutes on the phone, he actually gave up and hung up on me!"

Others described events triggered by advice from legitimate vendors, who told their customers to contact tech support firms which used the same ploys.

"My elderly parents called Canon because they were having problems with a printer," said reader Earle Greenberg. "Canon referred them to a [telephone] number for tech support, apparently third-party, who tried to do this exact same thing. They got so far as getting my parents to load a client so the tech could control my parents' computer and then showed them all the so called 'errors' and told them for $150 they could fix it and their printer problem."