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Author Topic: New Wrinkle In Phone Scams Mark Lensenmayer Phenomenal Film Handler Posts: 1605 From: Upper Arlington, OH Registered: Sep 1999 posted 08-20-2003 10:09 AM                     My in-laws got hit with a phone scammer/identiy thief this weekend. He told my mother-in-law (over 80 years old) that due to the blackout, the computer had listed my father-in-law as deceased, and would she give them her social security number and credit card number to reinstate things. She gave him everything he asked for, because "he sounded so nice". Fortunately, my father-in-law heard this and had her immediately cancel the credit card and report it to the credit agencies. Now, here is where the new twist comes in. I went to their house yesterday, and they were not getting phone calls. The phone would ring once then quit. That puzzled me for awhile, but I remembered that when I had call forwarding years ago, it did that same thing. So, I found the code to turn off call forwarding, and things started working. I believe that when the scammers got this information, they called the phone company to activate call forwarding, so that if the credit card or vendor called to verify the purchase, the call would to go to the scammers. They had called the phone company to disconnect the call forwarding, but it did not deactivate on their line until I punched in the code. This is in a retirement complex, and there have been others in the same community who have gotten the same calls. Looks like they are trolling that address to see what they can get on their hook. Scamming the elderly and those on fixed incomes is one of the lowest things one human can do to another.  |  IP: Logged Jack Ondracek Film God Posts: 2348 From: Port Orchard, WA, USA Registered: Oct 2002 posted 08-20-2003 11:39 AM                        Mark: You should do some more sleuthing on this. First, the weekend scammers wouldn't have been able to contact the phone company to mess with call forwarding until Monday. Only one or two companies I've ever worked with were willing to make programming changes fast enough to do the kind of damage you're worried about. You should be able to contact the company's business office and have them track any order activity, including who (supposedly) made the call, what they asked for, and what action the business office rep (and subsequent programmers) might have taken. All orders of this nature have a tracking number assigned to them from the moment an order is accepted (just like FedEX). That number follows the order activity until it is completed, and any costs or credits are posted to the customer's account. Second, the feature you're talking about (usually called "call forwarding variable") is not programmed from the company, only flagged on or off. The number that the forwarding went to had to be punched in from the customer side. In extreme cases, phone companies CAN program a forwarding setup for you, but it's not available for you to turn off... you have to have them disable it. That you were able to switch it off from your in-laws' home almost guarantees that it had to be activated from there in the first place. If the call forwarding actually does have something to do with the scam call, it sounds like somebody could be "trolling" that community in person. This gives the issue somewhat of a conspiratorial bent, but it is possible to access phone lines without being AT the phone. A knowledgeable person can use a phone or handset at a building's terminal, and can do anything from there that could be done from the customer phone itself.  |  IP: Logged Mark Lensenmayer Phenomenal Film Handler Posts: 1605 From: Upper Arlington, OH Registered: Sep 1999 posted 08-20-2003 04:10 PM                     Thanks, Jack. We are exploring a number of possibilities. Many people at this retirement complex have keys, and the in-laws are out of the room regularly at predictable times (dinner is ALWAYS at 6:00), so it is possible one of the employees is involved. It is especially suspicious that at least one other person in the complex had the same call-forwarding issue and one of the same scam calls. We will be reporting this to the management, so they can at least alert the other residents that they should NOT give out credit card numbers and social security numbers to strangers who call, no matter who they say they work for. It's a scary world out there sometimes.  |  IP: Logged Jeff Stricker Master Film Handler Posts: 481 From: Calumet, Mi USA Registered: Nov 1999 posted 08-20-2003 05:54 PM                     Thanks for the info Mark, My elderly parents nearly became vicitms of a similar scam a couple of months back. It's sad what these crooks will do.  |  IP: Logged Jack Ondracek Film God Posts: 2348 From: Port Orchard, WA, USA Registered: Oct 2002 posted 08-21-2003 04:31 AM                        Just a quick note to those of you who have a measure of influence over elderly people. Most local phone companies (mainly Quest, Verizon and MCI) have taught their sales people that there is no money in basic service (meaning "dialtone" only). Extra features that actually cost the company nothing to provide... like call forwarding, 3-way calling, caller ID, etc... are nothing but flags that turn on or off capabilities that the local switch is capable of without additional cost to the company. Additional features are literally pure profit. The phone companies are putting huge pressure on their salespeople to sell packages of services, usually at rates equalling multiples of what could have been purchased had the customer merely needed a phone, dialtone at the other end, and long distance service when needed. In some cases, they're offering their salespeople commissions only on products over and above minimum basic dialtone service. In Washington state, basic residential service is $16 & change. Many elderly people in our state could do just fine with this bare-bones service... just a phone line, and nothing else. Unfortunately, the companies are paying their salespeople commissions on packages... not basic service, so the incentive to upsell is tremendous, as is the effect on people who don't understand what's being pushed at them. Qwest was recently fined in Oregon for deceptive sales practices... and I think they've recently been slapped for similar tactics in our state.  |  IP: Logged Steve Kraus Film God Posts: 4094 From: Chicago, IL, USA Registered: May 2000 posted 08-21-2003 09:22 PM                    I have call forwarding on my business line and I can activate and deactivate it remotely by dialing a number (probably unique to that exchange but common to all users of remote access features on that switch), entering my number, a PIN, the appropriate code number, and the number to which I want calls forwarded. All guided by voice prompts. I customarily forward to my cell phone when I'm not there and usually activate/deactivate on site but remote access comes in very handy at times. I presume this is pretty standard so I don't think the bad guys had to enter the premises to activate it. The phone company logs should be able to tell to which number calls were being forwarded. For one thing, the line being forwarded gets charged for the connection from that exchange to the distant phone, pretty much like they made an outgoing call. So records certainly exist.  |  IP: Logged Mark Lensenmayer Phenomenal Film Handler Posts: 1605 From: Upper Arlington, OH Registered: Sep 1999 posted 08-22-2003 07:48 AM                     These guys were good. Just in that one retirement community, they have already had 4 people give out information and one lost $7,000. In every case, call forwarding was activated, yet the phone company shows no record of call forwarding being turned on or requested. One of the tactics of the scammers is that about 1 week after the first call, they call back, identifying themselves as the bank, prove they are the bank by giving the address and social security number, then getting the bank account information. Reports have been made to the police and the FTC.  |  IP: Logged Michael Schaffer "Where is the Boardwalk Hotel?" Posts: 4143 From: Boston, MA Registered: Apr 2002 posted 08-22-2003 08:42 AM                        When I came here and got my phone service set up, they made a big fuss about all the extra features (none of which I wanted) and then I was connected to an other company (or what they said was another company), which verified all the parameters of my phone service once more. I can see now why, but even the verifying company can be impersonated. Good thing it took the Social Security Office 2 months to give me a number - in the meantime I had been warned by enough people that I should keep it as secret as possible.  |  IP: Logged John Pytlak Film God Posts: 9987 From: Rochester, NY 14650-1922 Registered: Jan 2000 posted 08-22-2003 10:57 AM                        Once you are dead, your Social Security Number is in the public domain: http://ssdi.genealogy.rootsweb.com/ http://www.obitcentral.com/obitsearch/ssdi.htm  |  IP: Logged John Walsh Film God Posts: 2490 From: Connecticut, USA, Earth, Milky Way Registered: Oct 1999 posted 08-23-2003 07:39 AM                     To release SS numbers (even after death) seems wrong; it could invite some kind of fraud... Here in Connecticut, some total government a-wipe thought it would be a good idea to make money by selling drivers license information to marketing agencies. This included name, address, SS number, physical info (drivers wears glasses/prosthetics/organ doner, etc.) and even the picture. It was eventually stopped, but what person would even think of it in the first place?  |  IP: Logged Jack Ondracek Film God Posts: 2348 From: Port Orchard, WA, USA Registered: Oct 2002 posted 08-23-2003 04:04 PM                        quote: have call forwarding on my business line and I can activate and deactivate it remotely by dialing a number Oops... you're right about that, Steve. I'd forgotten. There are a couple of features, available in Qwest areas that have 5ESS and DMS100/200 switches called "Remote Call Forwarding" and "Scheduled Call Forwarding" (I can't say about other companies without looking at their offerings). It works just as Steve says. It's not commonly used among residential customers here, though... and isn't marketed in Qwest packages in any of the states I deal with, though anyone could get it if they asked. Most of my customers use it to route their calls away from their offices & call centers after business hours. That's something that would have been possible in this case. quote: call forwarding was activated, yet the phone company shows no record of call forwarding being turned on or requested. Mark, unless the scammers have someone on the inside, with direct access to the central office switch involved and the technical know-how to manipulate it, that would be very difficult, if at all possible to accomplish. Except in limited cases, the software that provisions a customer's account (read, "turns on the dialtone, activates features, etc") makes notes of all changes, in order to apply or credit the price of those features to the customer's billing. It's done that way to ensure the company gets paid for the features they provide... since so much of it is intangible. Even in cases where 3rd parties have access to provisioning software and the online connections to use it, tracking records follow literally everything that goes on. Even if someone does make an unauthorized change, I've never seen a case in 25 years of doing this stuff where it couldn't be tracked to the desk/terminal of whomever implimented it... Outside technician access to central office switches is limited to static IP addresses, is encrypted, password protected, and all activity is logged, if nothing else, so that programming problems can be identified and fixed when something goes fooey. Based on what's on this thread, I would be very suspicious of any suggestion of an untraceable "phantom feature". It sounds like someone's trying to cover their butt. By the way... this won't help anyone who's already been hit, but Qwest allows their customers to put a password on their account to prevent unauthorized account tinkering. It may, or may not be 100% effective, but it stopped me several times, & sent me back to the customer to get it. They wouldn't let anyone, even an outside vendor like myself touch the account without it. That might be something to consider setting up, if your company offers it and you're concerned you might get hit.  |  IP: Logged

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