Does anyone know how to tell if someone e-mailing you is a real mswindows tech?

Question

How can I safely contact and recieve support from MicroSoft(i "supposedly")have not recieved any updates for several months.Is this a scam-when your recieve bubbles from your task bar claiming that updates are ready for your computer click this bubble to download THEN it shows you that "the following updates were not able to be installed" What is this?I reported the problem to MS but the E-Mail doesn't seem valid that I recieved from the "microsoft tech"

Answer 1

If you have updates that aren't able to install from the yellow shield, try going to the Microsoft Updates site.  

Fast way: open IE >Tools > Windows Update (on drop down menu).

On the first page, click the 'Custom' button (not the 'Express'); that will give you specific updates for your machine (hardware and software).

Sometimes this helps...

Also, I've selected the 'Notify, but don't download' option on the 'Security Updates' page and do a manual download; that helps also to cut down the misfires.

To narrow down the source of the message; open your mail program, highlight the letter & select properties, then look at the header.  It will tell you lots of information about who sent it and the source IP, etc.

Answer 2

its a scam