# My Phone Just Called Itself



## XPostFacto

Today, a little after 12, the phone rang. When I went to answer it, at the same time, glancing at my caller ID, I saw that I was being called my myself. I picked up the receiver, but I heard only a dial tone. I know that  if you dial your own phone number, you will get a busy signal. Thinking that the local phone company was running tests, I called the Verizon repair service. Of course, it was my luck to get some ditzy little girl, who had never heard of that happening, and who said that there was no way that she could tell me whether tests were being run on my line in the field. But oh, was she more than willing to explain why I should consolidate Direct TV with Verizon. I told her I wasn't interested and in the same breath, good bye. If you're incapable of helping me, don't try to cover your ineptness by selling me something I don't want or need.

The same thing happened to my mother-in-law, last week, only there was a lady on the other line, trying to get her to invest in a business. It scared my 81-year old mother-in-law so badly because she thought she was being called by her late husband. I'm thinking that someone is spoofing our numbers for some reason. Anybody heard about similar occurrences?


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## Chuckt

It is called phone spoofing and should be considered illegal.  A telemarketer is using your name and number to call you with so I consider that fraud.  They know you are not answering the phone because you are using caller I.D.

It is fraud.  They are pretending to be someone else and it is unethical.  Think in terms of security.  
How do you know if the person on the other side of the phone has a record or not?
On top of it, it is unethical.


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## shart_attack

XPostFacto said:


> Today, a little after 12, the phone rang. When I went to answer it, at the same time, glancing at my caller ID, I saw that I was being called my myself. I picked up the receiver, but I heard only a dial tone. I know that  if you dial your own phone number, you will get a busy signal. Thinking that the local phone company was running tests, I called the Verizon repair service. Of course, it was my luck to get some ditzy little girl, who had never heard of that happening, and who said that there was no way that she could tell me whether tests were being run on my line in the field. But oh, was she more than willing to explain why I should consolidate Direct TV with Verizon. I told her I wasn't interested and in the same breath, good bye. If you're incapable of helping me, don't try to cover your ineptness by selling me something I don't want or need.
> 
> The same thing happened to my mother-in-law, last week, only there was a lady on the other line, trying to get her to invest in a business. It scared my 81-year old mother-in-law so badly because she thought she was being called by her late husband. I'm thinking that someone is spoofing our numbers for some reason. Anybody heard about similar occurrences?



Sounds like you may well be related to this gent:


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## Missourian

Don't be alarmed citizen.

This phone call was brought to you by:






Remember "Security first,  Liberty a distant second."


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## XPostFacto

Missourian said:


> Don't be alarmed citizen.
> 
> This phone call was brought to you by:
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> Remember "Security first,  Liberty a distant second."



I pity the poor dumb ass, who has to listen to my phone calls. They will be all about my wife reminding me to pick up a dozen doughnuts, and oh, she forgot to add such and such to the grocery list; or there will be countless calls on how well our horse is doing in its training.

To make matters worse, my mother-in-law got a call from another spoofer, claiming to be from the IRS and how she owed umpty squat on taxes. That's a fine one, since she just got a refund. I explained to her that it was another scam, that's been going on for a year, now. They like to target old people to scare them into sending large sums of money, probably to Nigeria. I haven't gotten one of those calls yet, probably because as soon as I say 2 hellos and nobody says anything, I tell them to perform an unnatural sex act on themselves.


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## TrainTime

I get all kinds of spoofed calls for some reason....I sell stuff on Craigslist and here in Phoenix we have so many newcomers that the calls on my items are often from out of state area codes.  So I have to answer them.  If you don't recognize the number or are getting hassled, enter the number on 
Google and you'll see others who are being pestered....then block it.


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## Ringel05

XPostFacto said:


> Today, a little after 12, the phone rang. When I went to answer it, at the same time, glancing at my caller ID, I saw that I was being called my myself. I picked up the receiver, but I heard only a dial tone. I know that  if you dial your own phone number, you will get a busy signal. Thinking that the local phone company was running tests, I called the Verizon repair service. Of course, it was my luck to get some ditzy little girl, who had never heard of that happening, and who said that there was no way that she could tell me whether tests were being run on my line in the field. But oh, was she more than willing to explain why I should consolidate Direct TV with Verizon. I told her I wasn't interested and in the same breath, good bye. If you're incapable of helping me, don't try to cover your ineptness by selling me something I don't want or need.
> 
> The same thing happened to my mother-in-law, last week, only there was a lady on the other line, trying to get her to invest in a business. It scared my 81-year old mother-in-law so badly because she thought she was being called by her late husband. I'm thinking that someone is spoofing our numbers for some reason. Anybody heard about similar occurrences?



It's a smart phone....... it's either being narcissistic or mischievous........


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## Chuckt

TrainTime said:


> I get all kinds of spoofed calls for some reason....I sell stuff on Craigslist and here in Phoenix we have so many newcomers that the calls on my items are often from out of state area codes.  So I have to answer them.  If you don't recognize the number or are getting hassled, enter the number on
> Google and you'll see others who are being pestered....then block it.



I have a Panasonic phone and we used up all the memory to block telemarketers.  Now what do I do?  I saw a few units on Amazon that might be able to give added protection.


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## Zoom-boing

We got one of these the other week but the guy on the phone (Indian with a very strong accent) kept saying that I needed to log into my computer so he could activate the protection service I requested.  I kept telling him that I couldn't understand what he was saying because of his accent and next time to use someone who spoke better English.  

Ever since we switched our phone service to Comcast and got caller id, we get many, many, many more robo/spammy calls than ever before.  Pisses me off.


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## Chuckt

Zoom-boing said:


> We got one of these the other week but the guy on the phone (Indian with a very strong accent) kept saying that I needed to log into my computer so he could activate the protection service I requested.  I kept telling him that I couldn't understand what he was saying because of his accent and next time to use someone who spoke better English.
> 
> Ever since we switched our phone service to Comcast and got caller id, we get many, many, many more robo/spammy calls than ever before.  Pisses me off.



They have several units on Amazon.  One has a 1500 phone book memory to block calls and the other has 2,000.  One already blocks 200 known numbers.

Just search for "telemarketer blocker" on Amazon.


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## R.D.

Ringel05 said:


> XPostFacto said:
> 
> 
> 
> Today, a little after 12, the phone rang. When I went to answer it, at the same time, glancing at my caller ID, I saw that I was being called my myself. I picked up the receiver, but I heard only a dial tone. I know that  if you dial your own phone number, you will get a busy signal. Thinking that the local phone company was running tests, I called the Verizon repair service. Of course, it was my luck to get some ditzy little girl, who had never heard of that happening, and who said that there was no way that she could tell me whether tests were being run on my line in the field. But oh, was she more than willing to explain why I should consolidate Direct TV with Verizon. I told her I wasn't interested and in the same breath, good bye. If you're incapable of helping me, don't try to cover your ineptness by selling me something I don't want or need.
> 
> The same thing happened to my mother-in-law, last week, only there was a lady on the other line, trying to get her to invest in a business. It scared my 81-year old mother-in-law so badly because she thought she was being called by her late husband. I'm thinking that someone is spoofing our numbers for some reason. Anybody heard about similar occurrences?
> 
> 
> 
> 
> It's a smart phone....... it's either being narcissistic or mischievous........
Click to expand...


Happened to me, too.   Land line.


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## Chuckt

Zoom-boing said:


> We got one of these the other week but the guy on the phone (Indian with a very strong accent) kept saying that I needed to log into my computer so he could activate the protection service I requested.  I kept telling him that I couldn't understand what he was saying because of his accent and next time to use someone who spoke better English.
> 
> Ever since we switched our phone service to Comcast and got caller id, we get many, many, many more robo/spammy calls than ever before.  Pisses me off.



Be careful with these requests of letting someone on your computer.


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## TrainTime

Zoom-boing said:


> We got one of these the other week but the guy on the phone (Indian with a very strong accent) kept saying that I needed to log into my computer so he could activate the protection service I requested.  I kept telling him that I couldn't understand what he was saying because of his accent and next time to use someone who spoke better English.
> 
> Ever since we switched our phone service to Comcast and got caller id, we get many, many, many more robo/spammy calls than ever before.  Pisses me off.



I got that one.....sounded like an arab, telling me he was with Microsoft and I needed to log on and "verify" my account information.  I told him in 12 years MS had never contacted me for any reason why now?  He muttered something I couldn't understand.  So I asked him if he was al-Qaida and if so, allah was a child molester who died of syphilis.  He went APESHIT while I laughed.


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## XPostFacto

Ringel05 said:


> XPostFacto said:
> 
> 
> 
> Today, a little after 12, the phone rang. When I went to answer it, at the same time, glancing at my caller ID, I saw that I was being called my myself. I picked up the receiver, but I heard only a dial tone. I know that  if you dial your own phone number, you will get a busy signal. Thinking that the local phone company was running tests, I called the Verizon repair service. Of course, it was my luck to get some ditzy little girl, who had never heard of that happening, and who said that there was no way that she could tell me whether tests were being run on my line in the field. But oh, was she more than willing to explain why I should consolidate Direct TV with Verizon. I told her I wasn't interested and in the same breath, good bye. If you're incapable of helping me, don't try to cover your ineptness by selling me something I don't want or need.
> 
> The same thing happened to my mother-in-law, last week, only there was a lady on the other line, trying to get her to invest in a business. It scared my 81-year old mother-in-law so badly because she thought she was being called by her late husband. I'm thinking that someone is spoofing our numbers for some reason. Anybody heard about similar occurrences?
> 
> 
> 
> 
> It's a smart phone....... it's either being narcissistic or mischievous........
Click to expand...


Nope. It was a land line. Cell phones don't work very well where I live. I have to drive 1/4 mile away from my house just to get one tic.


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## Moonglow

Your email is now being done in the same manner, you receive email from your addy...


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## XPostFacto

Moonglow said:


> Your email is now being done in the same manner, you receive email from your addy...



Maybe it's the NSA trying out new and innovative methods on America's unsuspecting citizens.


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