Possible telephone scam

[bojan]

Just received the phone call from someone (with heavy foreign accent) asking to talk to me (they knew my surname).
Then that person told me something about my phone rental line cost (because of accent I am not sure what exactly I was told..)..
I asked for their phone number so I can call them back, to make sure it's not a scam and they refused..
So I am 100% sure it was a scam call.

Any similar experiences?

[brian nordstrom]

:sadeyes: If I dont know the phone# of the caller I wont answer it , I am sick of these kind of calls .
Yes I have had a few , my concern is where do these people get our names and #'s from ?
Brian.

[DJVege]

I have a landline, but didn't have an actual phone connected to it because we just don't need it (landline only needed for internet as no Naked-DSL in our area). Recently I bought a phone and connected it due to the floods and telecomms outages, and STRAIGHT AWAY, the phone began ringing.

One call told my wife that Mr Pathak (me) had a $5000 tax refund waiting for me. ROFL. Scam baby. I haven't even put my tax return in yet!! And I'm pretty sure the ATO aren't ringing everyone who has a refund coming their way.

Phone is now off the hook again. Will only go back on when mobile reception and internet are both down again.

[pmrid]

I've had similar - people with thick accents saying they are from Telstra and wanting to see if I'm getting the most out of my current plan. Maybe I am now overly cynical about people cold-calling me in foreign accents. Last time I got one, I told him that I wanted to speak with his supervisor and the line went dead. 'Nuff said?


Peter

[Nortilus]

most of you should just add your name to the don't call register (google it) and if they ring you straight away ask for their phone number and address before anything else...if they refuse, hang up, if they give you these details, record them down and then get their name as well...and then report them to the dont call register and they will get fined...

[stephenb]

Unfortunately the "do not call register" cannot control overseas companies trying to scam you.

[Stardrifter_WA]

I used to think that they have a dialling system that just called numbers consecutively, but apparently not, as I very rarely get unwanted calls on my home phone. You see, I have a silent number, so maybe that does make a difference :question:

Cheers Peter

[Chif]

I get about 6 or 7 a day and don't answer most of them. I quite often get a scam call in which they are saying my computer is infected with a virus and they need to get rid of it. (I believe they end up installing remote access software or perhaps spyware of some type).

Whenever I get these calls I keep them on the phone as long as I can and waste their time. They get veryyyy mad at the end and will often curse at me before hanging up :D. The longer I waste their time, the less time they have to potentially be successful scamming someone that doesn't know any better.

[Baddad]

Hi Andrew,:)
That is the aim of scam-baiting. You may be interested in the following site. Its not everyone's cuppa tea but some enjoy it.

http://forum.419eater.com/forum/

A certain baiter had a scammer trying to sell him the Hubble telescope for $1000 USD. LOL:lol:

Cheers:)

[Octane]

Onya, Marty. My favourite site (after IIS). :D

H

[Dave2042]

Here's a nice one. Someone claiming to be American Express sent me an email asking me to log in to a NZ website because of a security breach. I ignored it.

A week later someone claiming to be American Express phoned me and with no preamble started asking me for personal details because of a security breach. I hung up.

Some days later another person claiming to be American Express phoned me asking why I hadn't responded to previous correspondence by email and phone. They quoted enough relevant details that it was clear they were American Express. We resolved that I hadn't been renting cars in Las Vegas, arranged for a new card and number (which duly arived), and confirmed that the email and previous phone call were in fact from American Express.

I wave my hands around speechlessly.

[Lee]

The banks don't encourage good consumer awareness in any case....
I had my bank (ANZ I think) ring me on my mobile once, and their opening line was - "It's Joe Bloggs from ANZ, I just need to confirm some security details before I start, can I have your date of birth and address...."
He was quite offended when I said, "no you may not"....

[kustard]

We get these at work all the time. They'll ring up, say that they are affiliated with Telstra and want to talk about upgrading to some insanely cheap plan. We ask a simple question, "Are you actually Telstra?" to which they say "No", so we then just hang up.

There was a place supposedly based in Melbourne that kept ringing us this way until we contacted Telstra and they must have banned or barred them because we haven't heard from them since.

[brian nordstrom]

:question: It must work , I have to see telstra tomorrow on my internet connection and I will ask if they can 'Silent number' my mobile ?
Brian.

[Stardrifter_WA]

Hi Brian,

Unfortunately, you can't get a silent mobile number, as far as I am aware. But then, I rarely get any unsolicited calls anyway. Although, I did recently get an SMS saying I had won $3,000,000....woohoo! As if.....you never get something for nothin' :D

Cheers Peter

[AdrianF]

We are on the don't call register but we get at least 1 phone call a day with phone ID saying overseas. So we removed landline phone and just use it for Internet. All our friends call us on Skype anyway

Adrian

[Chif]

Haha that's funny. I might spend a bit of time on this site. It's good to know there's a few people wasting these scammers time.

[Octane]

Andrew,

Warning, that site is very, very addictive!

If you go through the Main Scambaiting forum, and read the threads, they're so engaging and rivetting.

My favourite one is the M00seknuckle M0delling one. lmfao. I've read all almost-100 pages of the thread. Insanity.

H

[Barrykgerdes]

I get a few of these calls plus the usual Indian garbage but don't take much notice although if I need to run from the yard to answer the phone I am in good voice to give them heaps.

Barry