iPhone hack??
 

In the last 4 days I, my wife, one of her friends, and a business associate we haven't heard from in years have all gotten strange IMs from numbers we've never used. Mine was "Call me when you get here." MrsWD got the message, "Call me when you have a minute." The IM she received was from the number of the old business associate. When she called him he said he just got a similar message from her number! I've googled iPhone hack" and come up with nothing similar. Mrs WD is worried.
Does anyone know what's going on?

Did you just update to iOS 12?:D

Sorry. I'm no help, but sounds very strange.

Very weird. I'd guess that one of your wife's friends had their phone or some email or account hacked or compromised, and now everyone that they knew is being targeted.

Most likely something like this.

Back in the earlier days of social media sites one of the more common nefarious tactics employed to build a user base quickly was prompting the new user to allow access to their contacts so they could be matched up with their friends.

Then the site would create accounts for all the contacts and send them an email telling them friend X added them.

Have not seen it happen in the real world, but have heard that this year the hackers are targeting phones. Do know that I have been getting a lot more solictation calls from non-existent numbers. So much so that I installed blocking software on my phone.

That's not hacking.

That's just unethical marketing practices.

Simple solution, don't answer calls that are not in your contacts.