Does HP use 3rd party tech support?

[KM_E]

I called the HP support line with difficulty setting up a printer that had stopped working, and the tech accessed my laptop through AnyDesk and told me there was a Trojan on my laptop that needed to be removed.  After asking multiple questions about that, I reluctantly agreed and he said there would be a charge of $149 from "our technician."  The tech, who was likely from a call center in India, called me several times over the next hour while I was waiting for my laptop to be repaired, used 3 different American-sounding names, but each time the phone number was from a different state.  I inquired about this & he said that's how hp does their customer service, explaining to me that hp doesn't charge for tech calls, but when something needs to be fixed they use 3rd party technical consultants; they are verified with hp.

When they were done working on the computer, I received a PayPal invoice from Barrie Grant Equine Consultant, for $149, and when I looked up "Barrie Grant," discovered that he or she is a respected veterinarian in California.  When I asked the tech why a horse doctor was fixing my computer, he told me "maybe that's just the account the tech is using, but that account is  listed as a verified hp 3rd party technician."  O.k., yeah - I get that, maybe their spouse has a little side business using their PayPal account, but I can't confirm that.

After I got off the phone, I ran both CC Cleaner and Webroot to make sure they had not added malware to my laptop and saw nothing.  I also don't understand why neither of those programs caught this supposed Trojan - if it was really there, it should have been detected.  The printer and network are working again, but now I am concerned that I gave a scammer access to my laptop for over an hour.  Is this third party tech business legit, and hp's normal way of doing business or should I report it?  If so, who to?

[A_Gayathri]

Hi @KM_E,

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[Repairatrooper]

Unlikely legit, there are numerous "techs" out there who survive on having phone numbers and websites that appear like HP sites but are not. HP works hard to get companies like this taken down, but it is a never ending issues because they just pop up again like moles.  Unfortunately, in addition, malware programs also proliferate and often when first released can evade detection from malware and virus detectors.