Facebook Notified The FTC Of An Alleged $2.5 Million Scam

On Friday, a New York court ordered a tech support company to cease operations while authorities investigate allegations that it was selling "bogus" tech support to consumers, while masquerading as Facebook and Microsoft.

The Federal Trade Commission asked the court to shut down this operation after Facebook alerted the FTC to what the company was allegedly doing, a Facebook spokesperson told Business Insider.

The alleged scam worked like this, according to the FTC:

Pairsys bought "deceptive ads online that led consumers to believe they were calling the technical support line for legitimate companies."

They also called people on the phone pretending to be from Microsoft or Facebook.

Then the employees talked the people into letting them remotely access and control the person's PC and once they were in the person's computer they sold them " bogus warranty programs and software that was freely available, usually at a cost of $149 to $249, though in some cases, the defendants charged as much as $600."

It was lucrative business, according to the complaint, generating $2.5 million in revenue, in 2012, the FTC says.

While the judge on Friday granted a temporary restraining order while authorities look into these activities, if found guilty, the FTC wants to shut the company down permanently and for the company to refund the people who paid for such services.

This is another case where big internet companies will go to authorities to put the kibosh on potentially illegal activities.

We know that the big Internet companies like Google and Facebook are monitoring email and files looking for images of explicit images of children, and will report that stuff if found.

We also know that Facebook is scouring the Internet looking for, and warning its users about, stolen passwords.