Over the last day or so, aged mother in law has been getting calls from irate strangers all over the country demanding to know why she's ringing them. She isn't.
Today she had an irate man that was aggressive enough, and worried her sufficiently, that she rang the non emergency police number (who said as there was no actual threat there was nothing they could do, etc).
She's also told her phone provider, who have said they have no idea and can't help, though they will send an engineer to "check the line", for what that is worth.
I think her number has been hijacked by out-of-UK cold callers who offer her number up instead of theirs.
Is that likely? Any thoughts, better ideas, experiences or suggestions from the panel?
I've made reassuring noises, but as she is in her eighties and a nervous soul at the best of times, I'd like to do all I can of course.
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Technically possible for sure. There's even a free Android app apkpure.com/fake-caller-id/io.fakecallerid.fakecallerid
I called a company who cold called me to complain and they absolutely denied cold calling anyone, and for good reasons I believed them.
I suppose many people block withheld numbers so to give them a better chance of getting through they use a real number.
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No idea what's causing it but if no-one can sort it out then you could get one of those call blocking things. This one looks quite good but others may be as good or better:
www.which.co.uk/reviews/nuisance-calls/article/nuisance-calls-call-blocker-reviews/truecall-call-blocker-first-look-review
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Ah, you mean use a cold call blocker to block calls complaining about cold calls. That's a good idea. Thanks.
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>> No idea what's causing it but if no-one can sort it out then you could
>> get one of those call blocking things. This one looks quite good but others may
>> be as good or better:
>>
>> www.which.co.uk/reviews/nuisance-calls/article/nuisance-calls-call-blocker-reviews/truecall-call-blocker-first-look-review
That's the sort of thing. Rejecting ALL unknown calls is an issue if you're asking for some sort of callback service or the calls by appointment I spend my working day making. Those that screen the calls and ask me to say i'm 'Simon from Citizens Advice' are fine. A voice telling me only calls from recognised numbers are accepted means the client has shut the door on a service they've previously requested.
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I have had six calls in two days from a Manchester no. which I don't know and has been the area code for the Tameside area where I have no dealings. I googled it after the first two missed calls and found it to be known on Google as a PPI cold caller. I answered the 6th call and got an Indian lady. Before she had a chance to speak too much I told her I was with the TPS ( for what it's worth if she was abroad ) and stop the calls as I had no PPI to claim. I rang off before she spoke.
The funny thing was, she knew my name " How are you today, Edward ? The calls came on my mobile, so they hadn't got me through the phone book....which doesn't have my first name anyway
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Look at Trucaller for your mobile.
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Your landline provider or ISP should provide the means to block unwanted calls or, if you have a phone manufactured by Panasonic or similar, the same thing.
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Changed to Sky landline 6/7 mths ago - Sky Shield stops pre-recorded messages & the scammers (who got the number/name etc from TalkTalk hack) give up. It's free on Sky.
3 scammer calls yesterday (average number of calls previously) but none bothered to try & get through so 10/10 for the Shield.
Most landline operators, I believe, have similar schemes. It's a pain in the a*** putting in friends & family so they get straight through BUT it is a one time task.
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It isn't at all difficult to 'spoof' a caller id, and it is something regularly done by the less reputable calling companies.
I suspect your mil's number has been randomly selected by one such.
Frankly, if it is being widely used, (you could Google the number, or check one of the 'whocallsme' sites to get an idea), the the only remedy is to change the number. Any decent telecoms provider should do this on request, particularly if a Google search provides evidence of misuse
Inconvenient, I know, but the best answer.
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Thanks all. One of the reasons she was in a flap is that the irate man not only asked for her by name, but told her he knew where she lived.
A spot of googling may have answered more for me. First, one of those "who called me" sites shows the number has been queried 98 times in the last four days. As that's just one site and only reflects people bothering to check in there, so going to be a lot more.
Second, putting her number into google with a space in the right place and in quotes throws up her name and home location. Why? Because she is a church warden, and it's listed in the church newsletter.
Someone somewhere in the local community has turned that newsletter into a pdf and put it on the net. They won't have asked her permission and she wouldn't have understood the consequences if they had anyway.
Last edited by: Crankcase on Sat 10 Feb 18 at 07:36
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Landline hacked? - smokie
