A new twist on scam phone calls?

[NSWP]

51 minutes ago, getting older slowly said:

Hoping they go a party style cruise line.....  which would be good as don't go on them....lol

They are on Cunard Don, suit and tie 24/7.😆

[lyndarra]

I found an email in my SPam box this morning. I deleted it without opening.

It was headed, "USCUSTOMSANDBORDERPROTECTION - Come down to our office"

Has anyone ever received one like that?

[getting older slowly]

Cosh... you get all the interesting one...   all i get are energy offers, hearing aids

 

oh i did get this  one :-

Your Name was chosem by Destiny for an exact reason:

For you to become a Rich and Happy person!

How? Simple! Purifying your house from the Negative Energies that are unfortunately influencing uyour existence and preventing Fortune to reach you!

 

OHHHH   Negative Energies....... something to do with power points ???      lol

 

Don

 

 

[Aus Traveller]

15 minutes ago, lyndarra said:

I found an email in my SPam box this morning. I deleted it without opening.

It was headed, "USCUSTOMSANDBORDERPROTECTION - Come down to our office"

Has anyone ever received one like that?

I haven't received that one. It would be a long way for us to go. 😁

[Aus Traveller]

Just now, getting older slowly said:

Cosh... you get all the interesting one...   all i get are energy offers, hearing aids

 

oh i did get this  one :-

Your Name was chosem by Destiny for an exact reason:

For you to become a Rich and Happy person!

How? Simple! Purifying your house from the Negative Energies that are unfortunately influencing uyour existence and preventing Fortune to reach you!

OHHHH   Negative Energies....... something to do with power points ???      lol

 

Don

 

Wow! That is interesting. I haven't received that one either. I keep getting emails trying to sell me hemp products. It is all entertainment in these times when we have been restricted where we could go!

[GUT2407]

On 11/29/2020 at 1:48 PM, Aus Traveller said:

On the subject of scam calls, we have now got one on the old story "You have had an accident recently ...." We haven't had one of those for a year or two. The calls may not really be scams, but are probably looking for 'leads' that they will pass on to a law firm in Australia to receive commission.

Had one of those once and pretended I had one that lead to brain damage (didn’t take much acting) they ended up hanging up on me in total exasperation 

[By The Bay]

Here is an extract from an article posted on ABC website today. Full article here.

 

"ACMA has registered new rules that require telcos to publish information to help Australians manage and report scam calls, share information about those calls with other telcos and also report identified scam calls to authorities. If they don't, they can face penalties of up to $250,000.

 

There are steps you can personally take to protect yourself from scammers:

1.If you get a call from a number you don't recognise, don't answer it

2.If you receive a call from an international number that only rings once before stopping — don't call back

3.Don't ever let someone take control of your computer

4.Don't ever send money in response to a call or a text message

5.If you think you've been the subject of a scam — immediately report it at www.scamwatch.gov.au"

 

[mr walker]

Saw a story similar to that on news last night.

I actually have had a few discussions with Telstra in the past over their failure to be able to track & block these nuisance callers, especially on calls to our business lines.

I received a few of those 'accident' calls & would tell them that someone will track them down & blow them up - the calls stopped??

 

You guys put the mocker on me. I just had a missed call from a Miami, FL number which I didn't answer as no-one would be calling me from FL. They left a message which our phone service converts to text - it was a cruise agent trying to contact me! Maybe a free cruise offer 😉

[Bowm54]

My mobile number has been cloned by scammers today.

 

I did not know until I received a call from a very angry person demanding that I don't phone him again, this was shortly followed by another slightly less irate caller who received a call from my number claiming to be from the Australian Tax Office and demanding money. I advised him to report this to the police and I would do the same.

 

After temporarily suspending my phone account I called in to the local police station to make a report.

They said they could not deal with this and to contact scam watch. The police receptionist also said the police station had their phone number cloned by scammers and were inundated by angry victims.

 

They're everywhere and the authorities appear unable to catch them.

Also I doubt anybody will make contact regarding the scam calls apparently coming from me!

Edited December 3, 2020 by Bowm54

[Bowm54]

I have been made aware that my phone was not “cloned” but rather “spoofed”.

This means my account was not used so there has been no crime just severe inconvenience.

[Suzi66]

On 12/3/2020 at 3:56 PM, Bowm54 said:

I have been made aware that my phone was not “cloned” but rather “spoofed”.

This means my account was not used so there has been no crime just severe inconvenience.

Mine was used last week as well.  Rather annoying.   Luckily the person who rang me was quite nice and realised my number had been accessed and called me to let me know instead.

My husband is one of only two Telstra technicians in a very large geographical area (I'm talking 100km west of us, 150 north, 300 south and 300 east or a bit more).   I got a phone call from the "Technical Dept of Telstra" to say that the Technician had been monitoring my number in the exchange and discovered a number of problems.   Normally I hang up on them, if my husband gets the call he plays with them and tries to get them to hand over information that will out them as not being with Telstra.  This time I decided to play and said "I will thank him then when he gets home for dinner".   The guy on the other end repeated that I had problems with the line and the technician had found them.  I repeated that I would thank him then WHEN he gets home for dinner, emphasising the when.   Eventually after repeating this scenario a number of times he finally said "I think I have rung the wrong number" and hung up on me.

[Suzi66]

At the moment I have stopped answering my landline.   Stupidly at the start of the first COVID lockdown when everyone was at home I answered a survey about charities while I had a migraine and wasn't thinking properly.   A week later as nobody could leave the house they swooped.
Then 4 weeks before Christmas the charity calls started again.  I think the most I have got in a single day is 10.  They don't take the fact that you have already donated to others as a reason for a no, and hanging up on one last Sunday morning at 8.30 am ended up with an immediate ring back.  (Regretfully my husband did the answering accidentally as the phone was near his ear as he was trying to have a sleep in)

[GUT2407]

I keep getting missed calls from people I know would only ring (at that time of night) if something was urgent, but when I call them back, which I seldom do for missed calls, it wasn’t them.

[Suzi66]

12 hours ago, GUT2407 said:

I keep getting missed calls from people I know would only ring (at that time of night) if something was urgent, but when I call them back, which I seldom do for missed calls, it wasn’t them.

Damn scammers.

[cruise love]

Had a missed call from Carnival today

 

i have 2 cruises booked for April and July next year

 

Should I call them back?

 

has anybody else got a call

[Aus Traveller]

12 hours ago, cruise love said:

Had a missed call from Carnival today

i have 2 cruises booked for April and July next year

Should I call them back?

has anybody else got a call

No. We haven't. If I got a call from Carnival and I had cruises booked with them, I would probably call them back. Only a small proportion of the population would have a cruise booked with Carnival so I don't think this would be a con that scammers would use.

[OzKiwiJJ]

12 hours ago, cruise love said:

Had a missed call from Carnival today

 

i have 2 cruises booked for April and July next year

 

Should I call them back?

 

has anybody else got a call

Did they leave a voicemail?

 

If it was something concerning one of your booked cruises they probably would have left a voicemail with sufficient information for you to know what they called about. They would certainly have left a name and number for you to call. However if you have concerns call the main Carnival number as listed on their website and try to contact that person that way.

 

If not it may not be a scam, but may have been a "cold call" perhaps to try to sell you another cruise. There is no point in trying to call them in this case.

[Bowm54]

Received this today following my report.

[Gwendy]

It got so bad a few months ago, (about 10 calls a day), we redirected our landline to a mobile no, with a message  to ring our mobile, no number provided. You didn’t know the mobile no you can’t ring us. 

[shipgeeks]

The one we get regularly is supposedly from Amazon, re a suspicious charge of $720.  "If you wish to dispute this press 1..."

Interestingly, we do not have an Amazon account nor have we ever bought on Amazon.

[Bubbeh]

Six years ago when we moved into our current location, the only option for the internet was Telstra and we couldn't have the 'net without bundling a landline into the package.  At the time this wasn't a big issue as we believed we needed the landline.  However, after my father died 18 months ago we pulled the landline out of the socket and put the phone in the shed.  These days, using only our mobiles (Optus) we rarely get scams but whenever I get a call I don't have a 'Contact' for, I don't answer and if I don't get a message I figure it was a scam or somebody that doesn't need to speak with me anyway.  

 

Actually, this reminds me, I must get on to Mr Bubbeh to ring Telstra and find out if we still need to bundle our internet.  Might save a few $$$ which can go towards a future cruise .  🤔

[Aus Traveller]

19 minutes ago, shipgeeks said:

The one we get regularly is supposedly from Amazon, re a suspicious charge of $720.  "If you wish to dispute this press 1..."

Interestingly, we do not have an Amazon account nor have we ever bought on Amazon.

We have received that same call on many occasions. I press '1', and when I get to speak to someone, I tell them that I have never had an Amazon account and that  they will have a problem charging me because they do not have my credit card or banking details. They then insist that someone has made this charge on my account. I wonder if they are trying to get the person to reveal their credit card or bank details. Otherwise, I cannot see the point of their calls.

Edited December 19, 2020 by Aus Traveller

[By The Bay]

They are even using Police phone numbers.

 

"A scam in which fraudsters clone the phone numbers of police stations and call people threatening them with arrest has seen two Melbourne victims hand over $30,000.

Police in Victoria are investigating the arrest warrant scam and urging anyone who has been a victim of the scam to make a report.

 

Authorities are also reminding people that if they get a call or email claiming they will be arrested due to a tax debt, they should hang up or delete the email, and not call the number provided in the message." Source: the Age Newspaper.

[NSWP]

33 minutes ago, By The Bay said:

They are even using Police phone numbers.

 

"A scam in which fraudsters clone the phone numbers of police stations and call people threatening them with arrest has seen two Melbourne victims hand over $30,000.

Police in Victoria are investigating the arrest warrant scam and urging anyone who has been a victim of the scam to make a report.

 

Authorities are also reminding people that if they get a call or email claiming they will be arrested due to a tax debt, they should hang up or delete the email, and not call the number provided in the message." Source: the Age Newspaper.

Almost impossible to prosecute these scammers, many are from Russia, Nigeria etc.

[shipgeeks]

15 hours ago, Aus Traveller said:

We have received that same call on many occasions. I press '1', and when I get to speak to someone, I tell them that I have never had an Amazon account and that  they will have a problem charging me because they do not have my credit card or banking details. They then insist that someone has made this charge on my account. I wonder if they are trying to get the person to reveal their credit card or bank details. Otherwise, I cannot see the point of their calls.

Yes, I think that is exactly what they want.

I've never pressed 1 on calls like that; I just hang up.