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Various missed calls from mobile numbers

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Mcr Warrior

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Know someone who had to change their residential (Blackpool area) home telephone number because it was being used as a "presentation number" by scammers.
 
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BJames

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I wonder what the number for the contact tracing people is?
My friend is a tracer. Although I don't know the number, I know if you were to call the number back it would say something along the lines of "you have been contacted by NHS track and trace" and just give some generic information. I think they try quite a few times if they can't get through to you.

I tend to answer all calls in case its something important. I've had a few of those road traffic accident calls in the last couple of weeks - I just say either "no, don't call this number again" and hang up, or if I'm bored, I'll just say "oh right, what information do you have about the crash?" Suddenly they seem to know very little. It's frustrating as I only used to get spam calls on my landline but now they're coming through to the mobile number too. Would love to know which companies are giving out my number. I especially dislike when they greet me with Hi and my first name, as if we're friends.
 

xotGD

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My friend is a tracer. Although I don't know the number, I know if you were to call the number back it would say something along the lines of "you have been contacted by NHS track and trace" and just give some generic information. I think they try quite a few times if they can't get through to you.

I tend to answer all calls in case its something important. I've had a few of those road traffic accident calls in the last couple of weeks - I just say either "no, don't call this number again" and hang up, or if I'm bored, I'll just say "oh right, what information do you have about the crash?" Suddenly they seem to know very little. It's frustrating as I only used to get spam calls on my landline but now they're coming through to the mobile number too. Would love to know which companies are giving out my number. I especially dislike when they greet me with Hi and my first name, as if we're friends.
It is likely that nobody is giving out your number. The callers just try random numbers until they get through to someone.
 

yorksrob

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I got a scam call yesterday.

It seems this sort of nuisance is on the increase.
 

Huntergreed

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The ones I most often get are “hello, I heard about your recent car crash”, hardly drive and never been involved in a crash, usually I hang up at that point.
 

Jamesrob637

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I got a scam call yesterday.

It seems this sort of nuisance is on the increase.

That's the worst - when they call later than 18:00 and on weekends. Office hours is just about tolerable, though it shouldn't happen at all in this day and age of PCI/GDPR.
 

Peter Mugridge

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GDPR won't stop random number dialing - it only affects the retention and use of identifiable personal data.
 

DelayRepay

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I have noticed on my landline that I don't get scam calls for ages, then I get several within a few hours.

They all come from geographic numbers in different parts of the UK, and all have the same robotic american woman telling me something about Amazon Prime and a £39.99 fee. Then I won't hear from her for days, then it will happen again with 5 - 6 calls in the space of a few hours.
 

Trackman

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One I have had a few times recently is from BT Broadband saying they are either going to cut me off or I’ve downloaded something iffy.
It comes up a like mobile phone number.
 

John Hunt

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One I have had a few times recently is from BT Broadband saying they are either going to cut me off or I’ve downloaded something iffy.
It comes up a like mobile phone number.

Definitely a scam call, I had this one a few days ago.
Played him along for a while and made the guy totally lose it when I couldn't see the things he was telling me to look for.
I told him I was running Linux, not Windows, to which he relied 'Freddie, Uncle, Charlie, Kate' and rang off.
I had made a note of his number, reported it to Action Fraud and the guy there laughed his socks off at the Linux bit. :D
 

Trackman

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Definitely a scam call, I had this one a few days ago.
Played him along for a while and made the guy totally lose it when I couldn't see the things he was telling me to look for.
I told him I was running Linux, not Windows, to which he relied 'Freddie, Uncle, Charlie, Kate' and rang off.
I had made a note of his number, reported it to Action Fraud and the guy there laughed his socks off at the Linux bit. :D
What’s Action Fraud?
 

xotGD

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On Channel 5 at 8pm tonight:

How To Stop Your Nuisance Calls
 

route101

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Keep getting ramdom numbers from Macedonia and Moldova. Wonder who it is , i miss them
 

Typhoon

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It's where you can report not only scam telephone calls but any type of fraud. Just google it.
You can do it by phone or fill in a form.
True. Action Fraud is run by the City of London Police. Sometimes (I am sure unkindly) referred to as 'Inaction Fraud' by those frustrated by the lack of progress of their cases. They are solely a reporting bureau - they pass cases on to other agencies so the system is not particularly fleet of foot!
 

John Hunt

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Anyone watch it?

In a word - no.
I don't get many of these calls; the crash/claim ones I string them along as/when I feel like it, calls offering extended warranty on appliances I don't have I give them details of a fictitious piece of equipment and let them try to find details of it, the only worrying one I had was the one mentioned up-thread.
 

Lucan

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Anyone watch it?
Yes, it was mostly the same material as a broadcast a few months ago, but made up with some new Covid scam stuff.
all have the same robotic american woman telling me something about Amazon Prime and a £39.99 fee
That's Stephanie Hawking. You are lucky, she tells me my fee is £79.99, which does not seem to correspond with any actual Amazon fee - I looked it up as I won't have anything to do with Amozon anyway
It probably isn't from BT Broadband but rather a scam of some kind.
No kidding.
 

_toommm_

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I've been quite unfortunate with it recently. I've been messaged by ClearScore (a credit score app) to say my email, password and phone number have been sold online. On the back of this, I've been told by text my HSBC bank account has been hacked into (a spam text; I've not banked with them for years), I'm due several tax and NI refunds, I've had my Netflix hacked into a few times too, and incessantly get verification codes from Netflix, Amazon Prime etc.

Along with car crash calls, and I suspect calls where they're trying to entice you to say 'yes' in order for it to be recorded and subsequently used :/
 

Mcr Warrior

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On Channel 5 at 8pm tonight:

How To Stop Your Nuisance Calls
Is this another C5 repeat / revised repeat?
Yes, it was mostly the same material as a broadcast a few months ago, but made up with some new Covid scam stuff.
Not the first time this year that C5 have been broadcasting revised repeats which consist mostly of the original programme(s) with a few minutes of "new" material spliced in. ;)
 

Typhoon

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Is the ending this? Get rid of your landline!
It might be. Because of the 'efficiency' of Open Reach, I was without an operational landline for some time. Service was restored over 6 months ago and only 1 nuisance call since. No Microsoft Technical Department, no calls from 'your telecom provider', no Amazon Prime (@Lucan - Stephanie Hawking, very good), no accidents that weren't my fault. They'll be back, but I'm enjoying the peace.
 

Jamesrob637

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It might be. Because of the 'efficiency' of Open Reach, I was without an operational landline for some time. Service was restored over 6 months ago and only 1 nuisance call since. No Microsoft Technical Department, no calls from 'your telecom provider', no Amazon Prime (@Lucan - Stephanie Hawking, very good), no accidents that weren't my fault. They'll be back, but I'm enjoying the peace.

Hope you don't have many more. To be fair, 4 and a half months of the last 6 have been COVID times so nuisance calls should have been very few and far between anyway.
 

yorksrob

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The Government needs to start making some very public examples of the perpetrators of these scams. If they're based abroad and their governments won't do anything about them, we need to find a way of blocking/screening calls from those countries. Make legitimate callers go through an operator.
 

Typhoon

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Hope you don't have many more. To be fair, 4 and a half months of the last 6 have been COVID times so nuisance calls should have been very few and far between anyway.
Thank you but from reports on the media, the scammers are still very active, the 'compromised bank accounts' and variations on this are still proving fruitful, and they have been able to add COVID and 'Test and Trace' scams to their arsenal.
 

Typhoon

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The Government needs to start making some very public examples of the perpetrators of these scams. If they're based abroad and their governments won't do anything about them, we need to find a way of blocking/screening calls from those countries.
Exactly. You should be in government (not meant to be an insult); we need someone to drive through action. We as a country must be losing millions a year in these scams. If the government won't act and its MPs too busy asking fawning questions, the opposition needs to hit them at PMQs; Business, Energy + questions; Culture, Media+ questions; demand a debate - maybe the media will take it up, try and shame HMG into action.
Make legitimate callers go through an operator.
Excellent idea - that would drive genuine businesses into getting their government to act.
This almost certainly isn't easy but at the moment we appear to be doing nothing.
 

Lucan

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I've been told .. I'm due several tax and NI refunds..... I suspect calls where they're trying to entice you to say 'yes' in order for it to be recorded and subsequently used :/
Those are a type of scam called the Refund Scam. Also in this catagory are scams telling you that £xx will or has been taken as your Amazon Prime subs, or similar, where £xx is more than you expect or you don't subscribe anyway.

Refund scams are meant to galvanise you (in joy or panic) into allowing them to make the supposed refund. They say that to do this you must allow them remote access your PC (by talking you through installing eg TeamViewer), and then you must log on to your on-line banking to let them make the supposed refund. They then have control of your on-line bank account and transfer all your money to themselves. Even if you do not go as far as letting them into your bank, just your giving them your name and bank account number etc is a consolation prize for them.

You have to be very dumb or senile to fall for this, but for the scammers the potential rewards are big; life savings, half a £million from rich old folk is not unknown. But it can be legally risky as it is clear theft. OTOH the PC virus scam, supposedly cleaning up your PC, has lower rewards (£50 - £250) but appeals to a wider range of victims and leaves no evidence of crime - their fee may be steep, but it cannot later be proved that they did not really remove a virus without some very deep digital forensics.
 
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