Community Chat

[Kachina624]

Your first act should be to contact your phone company to determine what they have available to reduce nuisance calls.   I have a recording they put on my line that has all but eliminated such calls. 

[Tribesters]

Last week I had a telemarketer call my home phone at 7:02 am! Isn't that a little early? I told him he woke me up (even though I was actually just leaving for work) & he hung up. 

[Annabellethecat66]

@chickenbutt The block button is on your phone (all of the handsets).  I usually have a handset with me in one of the rooms.  It only rings 2X's before the call block sets in.  You can also 'unblock' in a minute if you want.  A lot of people here have them.  I've recommended them to several people here and they've come back and thanked me HERE.

As far as my iphone ringing.  It (as I said) doesn't happen very often but it does happen.  I ignore it and then when I park I go back and block the call.  I have daughters who live in other states (3 daughters total) and 7 grandchildren).  I would rather ignore the call (as I said, it come on the screen on my car so I know who it is, so without taking my hand off of the wheel (if I wanted to I could answer it.  I usually don't but I could.

As far as 'playing games with them, etc.  good luck because most of the time you are talking to a recording.  They have gotten very cleaver.  There's one call where a female says, "Can you hear me?  Wait a minute I have to adjust my head set"  You think it's a person not a recording.  I've already blocked most of those calls.

I'm glad some of you aren't bothered by them but I know for a fact there are people here who are bothered by them because they've said so.  

I was just venting.  The calls had died down after the election but for some reason today they'd picked up.

Right above the larger button (square) is a button called "CALL BLOCK", you simply push it an it says "BLOCK CALL" and you click "YES".  It is on each handset.

There is no running to any other object.  It's all on the phone so I don't know what you are talking about.  Perhaps I misunstood what you were referring to.  If so, I apologize.

[Mustang Shar]

Yes calls are insane

[hckynut]

@Annabellethecat66

Hopefully the perps that stole your info will be caught, the sooner the better. You probably have changed gas stations, but they should still follow through with catching these low lives.

Glad to see you do not answer any of those calls when driving. I still live in "my world" where many used to love vacations just to get away from telephone calls. Oh how "my world" has changed! 

As far as me talking to a recording? It would have to be one of the 6 figure ones. I carry on conversations with them and I love the ones that call about my computer. Since I am into that world, I really have a blast with those people. It takes them 10 minutes to figure out they were the fish, and I was reeling them in. Fun/fun/fun, I amuse easily at times.

hckynut(john)

[123SuzyQ123]

Twice a week for about 3 months now, I get a call from an Indian-sounding guy saying that he is with Microsoft and needs to "fix" my computer!!  HA!  

He calls from a different phone number every time, but I recognize his voice each time he calls. 

I've even begun telling him I do not even OWN a computer and to stop calling! One time I told him that I do not know what Microsoft is!  They are certainly persistent. 

[DiAnne]

I have had a unlisted phone number for many years.  I get very few of these calls - maybe two a week.  I wonder if that is why?

[dooBdoo]

          The "Do Not Call" registry does help stop calls from reputable organizations, so it's worth it to sign up for that reason.  It's also a good idea to read their site and understand that they work with limitations, so some types of calls are exempt from their control.    I'm not convinced, at this point, that it's worth the time to report calls to them unless they involve threats or harassment.

          We might get ourselves on call lists if we don't read the fine print when registering on websites or for sweepstakes, giveaways, etc.   We also need to be sure we haven't opted in with entities with whom we do (or did) business.    For the robocalls...  those are computerized.    They scroll mindlessly through a list of consecutive numbers, waiting for someone to pick up.   We pretty much guarantee more calls will come if we pick up the phone and talk to the caller or press buttons thinking we're opting out.   Once they know they got a "hit" on a valid number, they add your phone number to a list for future calls and sometimes share it with or sell it to other criminals.

          Several companies are researching methods to stop the junk calls.    Here's one article from August...  not sure if there are any updates:

"Apple, Google, FCC Team up to Stop Spam Robocalls"

https://www.macobserver.com/news/apple-google-fcc-team-stop-spam-robocalls/

[Carriestp]

I use mental call block - I just ignore the calls.  Too many numbers available to be used...not worth my time or money trying to block all of them.

They can waste their time and call me all they want.

[gardenman]

The failure to prosecute the bad guys gets very frustrating. Maybe fifteen years ago an employee at a record store in Florida used their billing system to randomly enter credit card numbers to see if they could get a hit.  They billed random numbers for a penny using the system and then would write down any numbers that worked. One of the numbers that worked was for my debit card. I'd never been to Florida, knew no one in Florida and had never dealt with that record company. 

I went to buy something for ten dollars and my debit card was rejected which was weird as I'd had over $500 in my account at the time. When I checked my account there was a long list of charges that I hadn't made, all from Florida. My bank repaid me. I filed charges and the police in Florida tracked down the clerk at the store, but they couldn't charge the clerk at the store as all that they could prove the clerk had stolen was a penny on each occasion. Once they'd stolen the penny and had the credit card numbers they put the list of numbers alongside their computer at their house which they shared with ten other people. Everyone at the house had access to the computer that was used to exploit the numbers and they all denied using the credit card numbers, so the police couldn't tie the larger thefts to any one specific individual.

This group of people had apparently gotten and used hundreds of credit card numbers, but the police and prosecutors had their hands tied. The only one of the group they could absolutely identify as being engaged in in criminal activity only stole a penny each time and the judge would laugh them out of court for charging someone with the theft of a penny. They were stealing thousands of dollars a week using this system and moved all around the country doing it.

It was a clever scam for them. Each of the people living in the house tried to get a job in a small business where they could gain access to the billing system and then they'd go on a hunt for active credit card numbers. They'd then share the numbers so no theft could be tied to them directly. I suspect they're still doing it.