My Phone # Was Spoofed . . .

[kenohrn]

 . .  and I got a puzzled Shaw landline call from a stranger who said "this number came up on my phone so I called it".

Clearly, some scammer has spoofed my number as their caller ID. If the number of such puzzled or angry incoming calls to me begins to become a problem, there isn't much to remedy the situation except to route such calls to voicemail, and there explain the situation and ask the caller to block my caller ID.  Eventually, the scammer will stop using the number as its value falls.

Is there a Shaw service that allows me to "whitelist" numbers and direct all others to voicemail?  I have reviewed Shaw's web stuff and only a blacklist exists -- and only 31 numbers long. 

[mdk]

@kenohrn -- spammers have no honour -- only bad ethics.  As far as I know, Shaw Phone has no "white-list" capability.

Does your telephone have the capability to set a different ring-tone for each number? If so, set some "good" ring-tone for each of your friends, and leave the "default" ring-tone for all "other" callers. Then, when you hear the "default" ring-tone, it probably is not a friend of yours (unless they are calling from a different phone, e.g., land-line versus mobile).

[kenohrn]

Hi:

The phone does not have a selective ring feature.  But it does display and speak caller ID or name listed in phonebook, so as long as we are diligent about entering people into the phonebook, it should help to weed out unknown callers. We'd need to continue to not answer incoming calls from unknown parties, and alter voicemail to advise people that our number was spoofed by a scammer and that they should block our number. 

So far, we have had only one such call from a puzzled person and we hope it will not increase.

[rstra]

You sure it was spoofed and not just someone mis-dialing?

[mdk]

@kenohrn -- we hope it will not increase

Spammers tend to be "hit-and-run". For me, I don't remember receiving a SECOND call from a (spoofed?) telephone-number.

Don't make a mountain out of a mole-hill.  🙂

[kenohrn]

Be prepared.

[kenohrn]

You are right.

It could be many things, but spoofing seems the most likely to me. Certainly it is the possibility that I'd most like to be prepared to deal with.

[YBNormal1]

When my phone rang it showed my landline #.   So I knew it was impossible for this to happen .  So yes I have experienced this as well.

[mdk]

@kenohrn -- one day last week, within 60 minutes, I received SIX calls from scammers. The Caller-ID information showed 6 different telephone-numbers, assigned to various US states. Also, 5 of 6 calls showed a very-long VOIP (Voice Over Internet Protocol) value in the "name" field -- starting with "V".  It could have been a malfunction within some scammer's "auto-dialer" system.  None of the telephone-numbers were mine.

[SteamGirlJayMac]

Three calls today so far asking if we'd called them. All were from unknown individuals. Our number has been spoofed.