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subject: Sacramento woman describes Dell tech support abuse [print this page]

"I've been violated"I've been violated. My life's been violated," said Tara Fitzgerald.

"I'm a woman, and no woman likes to be taken advantage of."

"Missing" nude photographs

Fitzgerald, 48, said she first called Dell's toll-free support hotline in late December 2008 after realizing she couldn't locate a number of

erotic pictures of herself she thought she had saved on her desktop

computer to send to her boyfriend.

The single mother of a 14-year-old daughter admittedly has very little

working knowledge of computers and the internet and was genuinely

worried about where the nude pictures might appear.

"I couldn't find them on my computer and that made me nervous. I didn't

know where they went," she said.

Fitzgerald said she was connected to a technical support representative

in Mumbai, India named Riyaz Shaikh. Fitzgerald explained the delicate

nature of the task and authorized Shaikh to assume remote control of

her computer Dell Latitude D620.

"I trusted him. I trusted him because he was a Dell technician," she

said.

Fitzgerald said she watched Shaikh browse the contents of her computer

from Mumbai, then watched as Shaikh discovered her nude photographs

attached to emails sent to her boyfriend.

"I watched him take the pictures out of my email. I watched him," she

said emphatically.

Shaikh later identified himself as an employee of Sitel India, an

outsource call center service which offers technical support under

contract to Dell.

Photographs appear on vulgar website

Following her initial contact with Dell's contract support provider,

Fitzgerald received an email from an unknown source notifying her that

the racy photographs had shown up on a vulgar website established

through a free hosting service.

The site, called "bitchtara," appears to have been created January 7,

2009 and featured 16 nude and semi-nude photographs of Fitzgerald along

with graphic descriptions of sexual activity she supposedly enjoys.

The site was still active Wednesday. News10 contacted the hosting

service to notify the company that the website violates its terms of

service prohibiting adult content.

Fitzgerald said she asked Shaikh how her pictures could have been

posted to the website and said Shaikh suggested her boyfriend provided

them. She said Shaikh offered to help her get the website removed.

Fitzgerald was unaware of a comment attached to one of her 16

photographs by someone posting as "rayizshaikh," claiming ownership of

the website.

"I never looked at the pictures. I was too embarrassed," Fitzgerald

explained.

Tech support rep offers to "work from home"

Fitzgerald admitted that what she did next was remarkably naive.

She said Shaikh convinced her to buy him a new Dell laptop in

Sacramento and ship it to his home in Mumbai so that he could work on

her case from home. A parcel shipping order from UPS shows Fitzgerald

spent $195 to ship the laptop by next-day air on Jan. 20, 2009.

"My conscience is talking to me, saying 'Tara, don't send this. Are you

crazy?' I sent it anyway," she said.

Fitzgerald said she maintained contact with Shaikh, both through

official Dell channels and through his personal email and cell phone.

Message logs obtained by News10 show Shaikh switching seamlessly

between his official Dell technical support account and a personal

messaging account/ for example Dell Vostro 1520.

Romantic conversations

Following the initial technical call, conversations between Fitzgerald

and Shaikh quickly turned personal. Fitzgerald admits being flattered

by the attention from the Indian support tech, whose MySpace page

identifies him as being 24 years old. "He's very charming and he knew

exactly what to say. It warmed my heart," she said.

Fitzgerald shared a number of personal emails Shaikh sent her from his

Hotmail account shortly after their first conversation, including the

following message dated January 11, 2009:

"There are no words to express how I feel about you. I constantly

search for the words, and they all seem less than I truly feel. You are

my life, my heart, and my soul. You are my best friend. You are my one

true love. I still remember the day we first met. I knew that you were

the one I was meant to be with forever."

Stolen Dell credit card information

Two months after Fitzgerald's initial call to Dell technical support for Dell battery,

the relationship with her Indian contact took a bizarre turn. On

Valentine's Day 2009, Fitzgerald said Shaikh told her he had fallen in

love with a 22-year-old woman in Tennessee who had also called Dell

technical support.

Fitzgerald said Shaikh actually introduced the two online. "I couldn't

believe it. It was so strange," she said.

Fitzgerald later discovered two mysterious purchases on February 17

totalling $802 charged to her Dell Preferred credit card. She called

Dell and was told the charges were for a computer system and router

shipped to a woman in Waynesboro, Tennessee.

A call to the woman in Tennessee by News10 was not returned.

Fitzgerald recalled Shaikh asked for her Dell Preferred credit card

information during an earlier support call, ostensibly to buy software

for her desktop computer. She said when confronted with the charges,

Shaikh did not deny using the account to purchase the computer for the

woman in Tennessee.

In a log of messages exchanged between Fitzgerald and Shaikh on March

18, 2009, Shaikh wrote:

(Riyaz...Dell Certified L2 (level 2) Technician) "ur my True friend

Tara... I am sorry Accidently I charged ur Dell Account but I will pay.

I don't want to loose my job. It was a mistake which happend with me

and I am screwed."

Fitzgerald said she has continued a dialogue with Shaikh in an effort

to get him to pay her for the fraudulent charges.

As recently as this week, Shaikh was still offering to pay for the

computer and router charged to Fitzgerald's account.

A message log from Tuesday showed Shaikh contacting Fitzgerald from a

personal account called "riyazrules:"

"We will pay u 1000. 500 and 500. remaining 500 u have to wait 2-4

mth."

Shaikh did not respond to an email from News10 requesting an

explanation for his behavior.

Incidents reported to Dell

Fitzgerald said she reported the inappropriate contact, data theft and

credit fraud to Dell on three separate occasions last year.

She said Dell's response was to send her an affidavit giving her the

opportunity to disavow the fraudulent charges on her Dell Preferred

credit card. Fitzgerald refused to sign it, she said, because she

wanted Dell to acknowledge the charges had been made by one of its

representatives.

Her last contact from Dell, she said, was a demand letter dated May 8,

2010 seeking a past due payment of $77 on her Dell Preferred credit

card.

Fitzgerald believes Shaikh was still answering calls for Dell technical

support.

"They haven't done anything. I'm upset about that," she said.

Fitzgerald also filed a report with the Sacramento Police Department on

July 22, 2009. There has been no movement on the report, she said.

Fitzgerald contacted News10 to publicize the ordeal despite the

embarrassment it will cause her. She said she was preparing her

daughter for the story to break. "I'd like everyone to know about it,"

she said.

Fitzgerald said stress had caused her to lose her job with a local

catering company. She said she struggles with the shame of allowing

herself to be so easily manipulated.

She said she was seeking an attorney to pursue a claim against Dell.

News10 provided Dell spokeswoman Elizabeth Shine with a copy of the

message logs and other documents. Shine said Dell would offer a

response by the end of business on Wednesday.

Sacramento woman describes Dell tech support abuse

By: www.ibuynow.com.au

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