Scam callers

[Steeldrifter 0]

All kidding aside..... I honestly don't think there is anything that will get rid of the majority of spam calls anymore. Now a days they have a way to clone numbers and make it look on the caller id like it's your local area code even when its coming from friggin India.

[SalarMan 0]

On the advice from a friend...I'm going to get an airhorn to blast into the phone.

[DWSmith 0]

1 minute ago, Steeldrifter said:

All kidding aside..... I honestly don't think there is anything that will get rid of the majority of spam calls anymore. Now a days they have a way to clone numbers and make it look on the caller id like it's your local area code even when its coming from friggin India.

And don't ever return a call you missed unless you know the person.  You might call a local number and it's gets transferred around so you get charged $5 a minute or whatever.

[DWSmith 0]

This is a bit different but I bought some monthly medicine for my dog for tick, flea, heart worm, etc. from our veterinarian.  Along with it came instructions on how to get a rebate.  I started filling it out around noon and by the end of the day I had received 4 emails from the pharmaceutical company trying to sell me a bunch of other stuff.

I'm getting my dog on some other medicine when this runs our.

[Steeldrifter 0]

45 minutes ago, DWSmith said:

And don't ever return a call you missed unless you know the person.  You might call a local number and it's gets transferred around so you get charged $5 a minute or whatever.

Yep that's how I am as well. Like others in this thread have said, They do the same, I never answer the phone unless I know the number, or am expecting a call. If it is a number I don't know, I do not pick it up. A few weeks ago I had a call and the message he left was something like "Hi Steve this is Joe Blow (can't remember his name) call me back if you would at ___. Nope, not fallin for that one. With my business website it is easy to find my name and number. If it was in fact a customer or person I need to talk with, then they would have called back. I trust NO ONE these days.

[Poopdeck 0]

I get very very few if any spam calls. Maybe a half dozen a year. The secret is I do not give my phone number out Willy nilly. I give my number to as few places and people as is possible outside of friends and family. There is no reason a store needs my telephone number to complete a sale. In the rare instances where they insist, they will usually tell you it’s needed to track an order, I’ll give them the telephone number of by parents home when I was growing up. If somebody else really really needs my telephone number I simply give them my parents old number but tell them to email me if they need to get a hold of me. 
 

I also keep my WiFi and my Bluetooth off on my phone unless I’m actively using them. A surprising amount of info can be transferred simply by other devices “asking” to connect to your phone. Once devices recognize each other there is a slight bit of data transfer occurring with that recognition even if no connection is ultimately permitted. I always tell people to turn their Wi-Fi’s on on their cell phone and walk down a street with lots of restaurants and retail establishments like you would find in any beach town in America. Notice how many Wi-Fi devices are reaching out to your phone. Stand at a red light and look to see how many cars are reaching out to your phone. Keep that stuff off. 

[DWSmith 0]

Sort of changing the subject again but Facebook demanded my phone number for 'security reasons'.  Really?!?!?!  Two-factor authentication for a half-baked social networking site of little or no monetary value to me?  Okay, I'll play the game.  I gave them my number so I could visit with my out of town relatives.  Was that enough?  Noooooo!  Then they wanted an up to date photograph of me for 'security reasons'?!?!?!  How is that ever going to help with security on that website???  I gave them an image of Bob Keeshan, a.k.a., Captain Kangaroo.  Now I'm permanently banished from Facebook and proud of it!  Bite me Facebook! 

[mikechell 0]

I rarely answer the phone.  My "answer machine" message is, "I get too many junk calls to answer unknown numbers.  If you know me or need to reach me, leave a message."

[flytire 0]

14 hours ago, SalarMan said:

On the advice from a friend...I'm going to get an airhorn to blast into the phone.

i get a call and i start tapping on my phone. they hang up

i also reply with a custom message "F#%k off"

 

14 hours ago, Steeldrifter said:

All kidding aside..... I honestly don't think there is anything that will get rid of the majority of spam calls anymore. Now a days they have a way to clone numbers and make it look on the caller id like it's your local area code even when its coming from friggin India.

 

i get calls from area codes ive never seen before even 860 which is my area code

 

[DWSmith 0]

I thought about it a little more last night.

Facebook asked for; my name, my location, my date of birth, my phone number, my digital photo.  They can look up my address from several sources.  What else do they need to create a phony ID of me?  Are they going to be asking for my SSN next?

Is it identity theft if people willingly give them this information?

I've seen a few people say that Facebook is evil and I think it's true.

[flytire 0]

this is about scam calls on my cell phone not facebook. thats a different thread all together

[niveker 0]

Mike's solution is the easiest.   It's what I do - just let it go to voicemail.  If it's important to me, it's from a number I know, which is already in my contacts and the name shows up on my phone.  If not, they'll leave a message.  All others can go to hell.  

[DWSmith 0]

16 minutes ago, flytire said:

this is about scam calls on my cell phone not facebook. thats a different thread all together

I broadened out to SCAMS of whatever kind.  SCAM callers may want your money, your Medicare information, SSN, or other personal information for identity theft.

Yeah, FB is a somewhat tangential but related topic.  I'll stop writing about it though.  Enough said! 

[SalarMan 0]

I have a question. Are all of or most of you using strictly cell phones? Specifically smart phones for basically everything?

We have 2 cells, and they are NOT smart phones. When someone calls either of those numbers they get the same voicemail message - "HI, you've reached one of George & Linda's cell phones. It is in the car and we are not, so please call the house. If you know us then you know that number. If this is a cold call please remove this number from your data base...and have a nice day."

I kept getting those calls on the house line about my computer being monitored and there was a problem they needed to fix. I would simply say go away I'm not interested. Well...one day I said I knew this was just a scam and go away. The person on the other end assured me the call was legitimate. So I just hung up. This individual made the mistake of calling back and I went off on the guy. My first 2  words were LISTEN followed by a 12 letter word with the first 6 letters being MOTHER...and the language got louder and worse. Guess what? No calls about my computer problem since. Maybe I should use that tactic more often.😎

[DWSmith 0]

Yes, I only use a cell phone and I've gone off on some phone scammers too and I liked it.