Phone Call Scams

[Roadrunner53]

This isn't a new one but last week and this week I got a robo call saying my SS number has been suspended. There are two of us in the house but it didn't say who's number and they said 'something is wrong' and to push 1 on the phone to talk to someone. UGH, what BS and I really feel bad for anyone who falls for this crap.

[dang1]

I got a similar voicemail from (510) 621-2453 recently:
"The reason you have received this notice from our department because we have found some suspicious and fraudulent activities under your social security number and we are going to suspend it. So if you want to know about this and to talk to our representative, please press one. I repeat, press one to connect."
That's the Google Voice transcription. I marked that phone number for block and as spam.

That call came into my Google Voice phone number- the one I give out to casual entities that ask for a phone number to contact me. That's set to do not disturb, and goes straight to voicemail.

Of course, people who really know me, know to contact me through Facebook Messenger or WhatApp or Google Hangouts or Telegram or even WeChat. Or my TextNow phone number, given only to close contacts. You can email my Hotmail but if your email address is not saved as my contact, your email goes automatically to the Junk Mail folder.

I can't really think of any scenario where an SS number has been suspended, so red flag for a scam right there.
I suppose it's good to enable your credit monitoring services- credit karma, many financial institutions where you have account(s), to email you when an unusual event has occurred- account opened, credit score lowered, etc.
I never respond to any emails, instead I log-in to my services' site to review any alerts.

[Roadrunner53]

Here is the latest phone scam. This one says I have an order coming from Amazon. I think they say it is a laptop and ear pods and the amount is $1537.35. It will be debited from my account. If I did not make this purchase to stay on the line and push 1 and talk to Amazon. I have gotten this call at least 4 times now, different numbers and always the same $$ amount.

I seriously cannot believe these idiots. If nothing else, you would think they would change the products and dollar amounts to switch it up. Just for the heck of it I went to my CC acount and Amazon account to see if such a product was actually purchased and it was not.

I still have a land line in my house and get so many scam calls.

[lost_in_the_endless_aisle]

There are tons of fascinating videos like this by Jim Browning who exposes how these scammers operate in detail.

[Roadrunner53]

There are tons of fascinating videos like this by Jim Browning who exposes how these scammers operate in detail.

Just watched this. Amazing and how disgusting these people are!

[lost_in_the_endless_aisle]

There are tons of fascinating videos like this by Jim Browning who exposes how these scammers operate in detail.

Just watched this. Amazing and how disgusting these people are!

A different approach but this is also essential.

[Dicey]

The scam du jour is "Customs" calling about my illegal contraband that has been seized.  I hit "1" immediately. When someone comes on the line, I exclaim, "Oh boy, what do you have for me today?" They always hang up.  Another tip is to wait until the third ring. Scammers typically don't stay on longer than that. You can adjust your VM settings to pick up on the fourth, fifth or more rings. This allows more time to get to the phone before VM does and eliminates a ton of spam calls.

[jinga nation]

rules I go by:
1. don't pick up the phone when it is a number you don't recognize.
2. if you do pick up, and it is a scammer, simply tell them "<person> dead, no speak many English" in random accent. If they press further, say "need money, funeral, please send cash". Don't forget to fake sniffle and cry.
3. Hang up.

[Roadrunner53]

This topic is a bit old but nothing has changed with the spam phone calls. I switched providers a few months ago. From Frontier to Spectrum. Yes, I still have a landline! I no longer work and am home all day long and the phone rings many times per day and they are all spam calls. Spectrum has a feature that you can plug in phone numbers to block. In probably a week and a half I have put in 30 phone calls to block. But there is no end to it. It's like an ant nest. You think you have killed them all and more and more keep crawling out. I used to use Nomorobo but this is easier. I just hope they allow unlimited blocking numbers because there is no end to this insanity. When our doctor calls he does not have a caller ID and his number is all zeros so you have to be careful who you block.

I get texts that my Amazon account has been frozen quite often.

What is really sad is for older people who 'don't get it' that these people are scammers and the old people give out information. When my Mom was alive, she would tell me about some woman named Rachel who would call her. It was a robo call and Mom didn't know the difference from a real person or the recorded message. She would hang up. I told her these people are not real, they are recorded messages and to hang up if you don't know who they are. She wised up but not all know what is going on. There used to be a day when the phone rang it was legitimate. Your friend, doctor, bank or someone you wanted to call you. Now it is just aggravation.

They keep saying they are passing laws to make this crap stop but if so, it doesn't work!

Just to vent a little more, when I switched over from Frontier to Spectrum, I went about 5 days into the next billing period. I called them to ask if I would get a refund and went around and around. I was on hold forever. It was a giant nightmare. I even spoke to some manager, and she said I would get a ballpark amount back of around $205. Well, I just got my final bill the other day and my refund was a big whopping 1 cent! They sent me a check for 1 cent! I called them and another woman tells me that they do not do prorating and it is in the contract. If you go one day into the next billing period and cancel, you get billed for a whole month except for the phone. TV and Internet has no prorating. OMG! These cable providers are beyond evil and how do they get away with it? So, to say the least, Frontier is off my list as a provider FOREVER!

[Sibley]

I suspect that "no prorating" may be illegal. So, if you want to deal with it, go for it.

[Roadrunner53]

Frontier does not refund any money for a partial month if you have discontinued service early.

https://www.journalinquirer.com/harlan_levy_consumer_diary/leave-it-to-levy-full-frontier-bill-after-mid-month-cancellation/article_8cffeea4-2011-11e9-ba33-9f511e276fe0.html#:~:text=%E2%80%9CTermination%20of%20TV%20and%2For%20internet%20services%20will%20be,refunds%20will%20be%20provided%20for%20services%20previously%20billed.%E2%80%9D

Before you disconnect, find out when your billing month ends to prevent these greedy companies from sticking it to you.

[Loren Ver]

Blocking the phone numbers probably isn't going to help since they are "spoofing" legitimate phone numbers.  That means pretending to be someone else.  I've had my phone number spoofed by a scammer, so then people would call me and ask me to stop calling them dozens of times a day.  I told them it wasn't me, and that my number would fall off the rotation in a few days, which it did.  Apparently the scammers were calling this one teen a few hundred times a day using my number (if the mom was to be believed).  I told the mom to block my number since there was nothing I could do about it.

Ugh.  It is a mess from both sides.  I have a landline too.  Knowing that these scam calls can be dealt with but haven't really is annoying. I don't know what the biggest one is for us since they haven't been leaving a message on the answering machine.

[snic]

There is a solution to spam calls on landlines: use a VOIP provider called Callcentric. I have been using them for my landline for several years and it has reduced robocalls by 100%. This works by configuring a service Callcentric has in which a robot answers for you and asks the caller to press a digit (randomly chosen) to continue. Robocallers never press, and the call disconnects. Real people will usually press the digit. Fortunately, you can easily add numbers of known contacts to a whitelist and their calls will go straight through. Callcentric's prices are very reasonable, too.

The drawbacks are that you need to buy an inexpensive piece of equipment ($40 or so) that plugs into your router, which your phone plugs into; and you have to configure everything yourself. They do have guides on how to do that and their tech support is responsive, although it is only by email. When I moved my elderly mother to an assisted living place near where I live, I transferred her number to Callcentric and set it up for her; I'm close enough that if there are any equipment problems I can stop by and fix them. But the reality has been that once it's set up, it just works. And I no longer have to worry about my mother answering some scammer's call and becoming a victim.

If you get really angry at robocallers, look up a service called Jolly Roger Telephone Company. You can have known scam numbers transferred to a robot who will waste the caller's time. Via Callcentric, it's even possible to have specific numbers transferred directly to Jolly Roger without ringing your phone. I've used this on a couple of occasions, most recently when a debt collection agency kept calling (looking for someone who doesn't live here). They got the message pretty fast.

With cell phones, I use Google Fi and the rate of spam calls seems to vary. For a while it was low enough that I turned off call screening. But it's starting to pick up again so now all calls from unknown numbers are screened by the "google assistant".

[GuitarStv]

Telecom companies could easily put an end to this tomorrow.  They don't because they make money by allowing it.  If you really want to fix the problem, I think you've got to get buy in from the people who maintain the phone networks.

[PDXTabs]

Telecom companies could easily put an end to this tomorrow.  They don't because they make money by allowing it.  If you really want to fix the problem, I think you've got to get buy in from the people who maintain the phone networks.

T-Mobile now lists some incoming calls as verified, that is not a spoofed number. I'm not sure what technology they are using on the back end. This works on my unlocked Pixel 5a. https://www.t-mobile.com/news/press/caller-verified-note9

[Travis]

A trick I've found to alleviate the spam is that I have a local number tied to my SIM and a Google Voice number that I've carried with me for about 8 years. It's based out of an area code I no longer live and don't know anybody there, so when a call comes in matching that area code I know instantly that it's spam. On the off chance they leave a voicemail I can see the text start out the same way every time "You've been selected/won/we're calling because..." I've only had my local number for about six months, but so far I haven't received any spam/phishing attempts on it. Email is another story.

[Michael in ABQ]

I get business calls from all over the country on my phone - plus I used to work with people that had numbers from all over the country. So I answer every call. I still get relatively little spam - maybe once a week on average. My number is a bit unusual - the 5 of the 7 digits are the same number (i.e. 222-22##) so when I try to call people back they sometimes think it's spam.