Nightmare: Telemarketer spoofed our number

[cstreit]

I'm sure you've all gotten the robocalls that seem to come from a local number. THese scammers use that trick to try and get people to answer.

Well - today they are using our business number as their caller-ID. ...because at noon CST I start getting 10-15 text messages a minute from people saying "I'll call back later" and angry voicemails like "Why do you keep calling me", etc... etc...

Its so bad we had to shut off the phones and change the message to say "If you got a call from this number, ignore it, because it was spoofed." We have an autoresponse to incoming text messages to the business.

Some research says this will usually stop after a few days. ...but basically they are DDOS'sing my business.

...and its NOT illegal.

[berettafan]

Phone service to US citizens should only be allowed if you have a resident agent in the country. Period. Phone co’s need to be penalized and violators need to be jailed.

[cstreit]

THis has never happened to me before.

...but it occurs to me you could weaponize phone calling against a business. I this continues for more than a few days I will have to change our number. We've had to shut off phone and text messaging due to 100's of incoming messages.

Imagine if someone did this to their competition. You could nearly put them out of business. Just spoof their number and call 5M people.... They'd be paralyzed dealing with the issue. Can't believe this isn't illegal.

[oldE]

My feeling is the annoying, disruptive behaviour will continue until it is made illegal to knowingly abet a fraudulent activity. That would put the telecoms in a position to be charged for not denying service to the centres who are perpetrating this sort of crap.

Best
Les




.

[widebody911]

Originally Posted by cstreit

TCan't believe this isn't illegal.

As long as Ma Bell still gets her cut, it's all good.

[GH85Carrera]

I have had my cell number spoofed. I received several several angry calls from strangers, and they were mad I called them. After the second call, I figured out I was spoofed. Fortunately they changed to a different spoof number. I have even had one call from my own number. That is weird to see that I was calling myself.

The phone systems need to be changed to make spoofing the number impossible. Like a built in caller ID. If the number calling is not really the number is says, block it.

Call the FCC and your representatives and senators. Only they can stop it.

[widebody911]

Originally Posted by oldE

the annoying, disruptive behaviour will continue until it is made illegal to knowingly abet a fraudulent activity.

No. It's technically illegal now, but none of the parties that can do anything about it give a flying *****. It will continue until it's prohibitively expensive to continue doing so, or people start ending up in FPMITAP.

[cstreit]

Actually its not illegal as long as their isn't "malicious intent" which would be very expensive to prove in court.

Thats assuming there was ANY way to trace it back - which again, is expensive and the telecoms don't give a damn. They're getting paid either way. Probably more...

[cstreit]

We've added an auto-responding text message and changed our voicemail to tell people to ignore the calls.

...and they've proven to me why these scams work.

People aren't paying attention and just leaving voicemails and text conversations anyway.

"Who are you and why are you taking my money?"
"why do you keep calling me?"

...and on and on it goes....

[Dantilla]

If this happened to a few senators and/or congressmen, it would be stopped in a hurry.

[spuggy]

Originally Posted by cstreit

Actually its not illegal as long as their isn't "malicious intent" which would be very expensive to prove in court.

Looks illegal to me.

https://www.fcc.gov/document/fcc-proposes-82-million-fine-spoofed-telemarketing-robocalls

https://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2019/03/fcc-fined-robocallers-208-million-since-2015-but-collected-only-6790/

Since Ajit Pai became FCC chairman in January 2017, the FCC has issued $202 million in forfeiture orders against robocallers but has collected none of it, the Journal wrote. That includes a $120 million penalty issued in May 2018 against a robocaller that was accused of making 96 million robocalls during a three-month period in order to trick people into buying vacation packages.

Separately, the Federal Trade Commission has collected $121 million out of $1.5 billion worth of penalties issued against robocallers since 2004, the Journal report said. An FTC spokesperson told the Journal that it is proud of its 8 percent collection rate.

[Zeke]

Originally Posted by cstreit

Actually its not illegal as long as their isn't "malicious intent" which would be very expensive to prove in court.

Thats assuming there was ANY way to trace it back - which again, is expensive and the telecoms don't give a damn. They're getting paid either way. Probably more...

Why should you bear any expense? If you document what's going on, recording the recordings, times and frequencies, and how this is negatively affecting your business, you should be able to submit your problem to your state general attorney. If they say there's not much they can do, just ask who to call.

This is not a civil matter. It involves your public utilities commission, or whomever they call that body of government nose jobs. You have rights. Interstate commerce might be involved. You think your attorney general and your utilities watchdogs, as well as your local phone company all want the feds asking for reports, etc.

I hope you vote and I hope you have all of your business licenses and whatnot in order, because if not one or both, you can just keep quiet. Meanwhile, if so, do reach out to any elected officials including your state governor.

You know the old expression, don't make a federal case of it. Actually do. If we as citizens don't make a fuss, then widebody is right. And my last thought is that there is no way the right people can't trace the source of the calls. That is the problem in that there's not currently a good way to block incoming calls from another network in a foreign country.

That can change.

[Clint Lando]

Forward calls to congressman office

[Zeke]

Originally Posted by Clint Lando

Forward calls to congressman office

Hah! They will have an answering machine for sure.

[cstreit]

OK. I wish I could save this one. I just got a message on our vmail....

"Do you know who you are talking to? This is Bob Weir formerly of the Grateful Dead. Is this important? I don't have time for *****."

Lol. I'm saving that number just in case.

[Geoz1]

Originally Posted by cstreit

OK. I wish I could save this one. I just got a message on our vmail....

"Do you know who you are talking to? This is Bob Weir formerly of the Grateful Dead. Is this important? I don't have time for *****."

Lol. I'm saving that number just in case.

Do you think it's him? Either way, pretty cool.



This spoofing crap is going on in DuPage area like the plague. This is often brought up in conversations with people I talk to. I received a call today from one of these clowns. The caller id showed the number as being 1 number higher than my number.

IE Use 1234 for the last 4 of mine, their's was 1235.

[porsche4life]

This is what happens when you make an industry insider chairman of the FCC. Nobody gives a damn about stopping this.

[widebody911]

Originally Posted by porsche4life

This is what happens when you make an industry insider chairman of the FCC. Nobody gives a damn about stopping this.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Regulatory_capture

At the risk of being PARFy: if there's one thing Trump is good at, it's putting foxes in chicken coops.

[cstreit]

Originally Posted by Geoz1

Do you think it's him? Either way, pretty cool..

I was curious so I looked him up. Google says he lives in California, the number was in the Carolinas. So probably not... ...but I saved it as "Fake Bob Weir?" in my contacts just in case.

I have the real Bowzer (from Sha na na's) email and phone from a similar circumstance. Someday it will come in handy.

[cabmandone]

I have often wondered how long it will be before I see my phone number pop up on my screen and I end up putting it on my blocked list. Yesterday I'd bet I had 15 robo calls and at least 5 were from the 419-203 exchange. I was joking with a friend the other day that I was going to have every number in that exchange blocked before long.