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new scam.. ATT put my account on hold

D

dan330

Extreme Android User
2 weeks ago.. i got a call .. from my own phone number!!! I am an ATT customer. on a shared account with others. (6 active phones .. work related).

when i answered ..
i hear the ATT .. quick tune.. then an automated female voice said..
my account has been put on hold due to odd activity.
enter my zip code to verify. I entered the zip of the account.
then i thought this is too odd... and hung up.

I then called the account holder to verify issue..
he said there is NO odd activities... and phones work.
so ignore it for now. .. hung up.

15 mins later..
i got a call from the account holders number....
answered it.. and it was the ATT .. quick tune .. and same automated number!!!!
hung up...

so.. it must be a scam.. because the phones are just fine 2 weeks later.
i have gotten that call 2 more times during this time.

what worries me most..
is that it was able to call me with the account holder's number (call ID).
scared it was able to see who i called after the initial call???
or did it know who the main holder number and used it.
no one else in the group got this scam call.

is my PHONE... hacked? something looking and recording my calls?
 
i doubt it. if your phone's hacked it is usually to obtain personal info. why bother to tip you off that the phone is hacked? i would contact both your acct holder and even att and see what they say.
 
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If someone has got hold of the numbers on the account the second call could just be them working through the sequence, not anything to do with who you called inbetween.

Sounds like phishing - they'd probably have asked you to supply more identifying information if you'd stayed on the line.

Of course these things can be a problem. I've tried explaining it to my bank or credit card company on the rare occasions they've called me: I know you want to be sure you are speaking to the right person, but you called me, not the other way round, so how do I know who you are? If you expect me to answer identity questions when you initiated the call, what's to stop scammers doing the same? By asking the question you undermine your own system. So the last time they did that, which was a good few years ago, we hit an impasse: I would not answer their questions, and their script didn't provide them any way of proceeding.

(Of course if it's important the answer is to hang up, look up their official contact number yourself, and call that back from a different phone. With landlines, at least in my country, the call isn't broken until the caller hangs up, and they often take advantage of that to trick people who are smart enough to want to call back but don't realise that it's really still the same call).
 
Your number is spoofed, that's all. Nothing out of the ordinary these days with spammers.
I use YouMail to block all numbers other than contacts, along with blocking numbers starting with my area code and 1st three digits.
So I'll never get a call from myself.
 
Early this month I started getting phone calls from myself--on my landline. I answered a couple of times, just for the hell of it; once there was just nothing, and then click, the other time a recorded spiel started talking.

The frequency of these calls kept increasing. I let them go to voicemail, as I do with all unknown callers, and they quickly hung up.

I contacted AT&T. They said they can't do anything; ditto for the police, unless a crime is actually committed. Apparently, spoofing someone's name and number, and making many annoying calls to that person, is not a crime.

So I blocked myself! :D
 
thanks guys and gals

scam .. yes.. easy to see.

spoofing a phone number.. that you are calling.. is easy to do.

my worry is...
how did they spoof a number that i just called??
how did they get that info?? to use to spoof back to me??
 
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