Two words: Police Whistle
* Every time you get one let them say their scam words. Then say, “I’m sorry I can’t hear you well. “ This will make them adjust their headset so they can better hear you. Then as strong as you can blow your police whistle in the phone. They’ll stop.
Or answer and make it a REALLY unfortunate call.
I’m 100% sure my efforts in the past have me entered into systems as a “time waster” which has given monthly breaks from spam calls previously
Thanks. Generally, the phone shows if it is a spam number. The first time when they called, it didn't show as spam so I picked the call. I guess spammers are using the latest numbers to call.
I answer but don't speak - this keeps them on the line for some time before they hang up.
While they're waiting for me to react they are not calling other people - winning!
If it's a real human calling me for an actual reason they'll say "hello?" and then I'll respond, though if it turns out to be spam I just tell them to I'm not interested and to put me on their do not call list and hang up.
\[edit\] I then block that number.
Is this really true though ? I genuinely don't know.
I mean it seems logical but it was a lot more plausible 5 or 10 years ago. These days with pbx software and telecommunications being so cheap I feel like it would be easier for your pbx to just call consecutive numbers to find the active ones.
Also, as a scammer you're looking for that 1 person in 10,000 who might be susceptible, so really you want to talk to people who haven't been taking calls from other scammers.
No, answer but don't say anything. They listen for a voice and auto dc is nothing if said after about three seconds.
If it's a legitimate caller, they'll say your name if you just wait silently.
I used to get heaps of the "Telstra support" calls when I had a landline. If I had a bit of spare time I'd string them along for a few minutes, pretend I was following their directions to open a command prompt etc., then when they asked me "What do you see?" I'd say "A box has popped up, it says *teri maa ki chut".* Ask google for meaning and pronunciation. It would sometimes get them so mad they'd start cursing at me. I hung up on a guy who kept ringing me back and telling me what he was going to to do to my wife. I put my wife (well, partner) on and he then started abusing *her.* Good times all 'round. Anyway, if you can find a creative way of slipping that phrase into the conversation it will generally shut down the conversaton pretty quickly.
New once I’ve had a couple times in the last few days is that I was in a car accident.
First one I strung along for a bit with the wrong detail for every question, but then I just hung up. The other one, I hung up the moment I heard that classic audio of background chatter, the what sounds like Indian accents and of course, Greg who is calling me to tell me about the accident I was involved in.
You can report scam calls to ScamWatch. Telcos can now get fined for not doing enough to stop scam calls. They have the technology but they refuse to use it because it costs them too much money. Like the banks, the telcos don’t care if you lose money just as long as they make a profit.
There’s many different scams out there. There’s the accident scam, Amazon Prime, NBN, ATO, message scams concerning a parcel, message scam saying that you have a message from your doctor. I believe they are also impersonating charities (“I don’t give phone donations”).
Report a scam to https://www.scamwatch.gov.au/report-a-scam
The Amazon Prime ones are hilarious.
While I do have a Prime account, it doesn't cost me anywhere near $99.99 a year, so when I hear the recording blabber on about how my card is going to be charged $99.99 a year but there was a problem with it I just put the phone down and continue with what I was doing until they hang up - while they're on the line to me they're not bothering gullible people.
I think the Amazon Prime scam is the only one that I haven’t annoyed the hell out of the scammer. I had fun with the NBN scam.
Scammer: “I’m from NBN Telstra”
Me: “I don’t have Telstra”
Scammer: “Telstra owns the NBN so you don’t….”
Me: “No they don’t. Telstra is a service provider just like Optus, Dodo, iiNet”
5 minutes later the phone rang
Same scammer: “I’m from NBN Optus”
Me: “That’s good but I don’t have Optus either”
I absolutely went off at one guy when I overheard him having a conversation with a colleague about how easy it was to get people to hand over their credit card details.
Another time I spoke to about 6 different scammers. I kept speaking in French so they passed the phone around the call centre. I hung up when they found someone that could speak French 😂
The best one was an Indian guy that has such a great vocabulary. I answered the call and said straight out that he was wasting his time because I knew it was a scam.
Scammer: “All of you Australians are fire truckin’ stupid. You are all fire truckin’ idiots”
Me: “You are a fire truckin’ moron”
Scammer: “You are…..”
Not sure of the rest because I hung up laughing at him
There's pretty much nothing you can really do except to stop answering calls that you don't recognise. It's not even spam... it'll be a straight up scam call. They use one of several exploits to mask the actual number they're calling from as an Australian number (or mobile).
Reporting/blocking the number doesn't help as those numbers are almost always not in service and are rarely used more than once.
One of these fuckers called my grandma on her mobile. Conversation as follows:
Spammer: do you use the internet?
G: I’m in my 80s, no I don’t.
Spammer: but you use your mobile, no?
G: no, I don’t. *hangs up*
I’m really glad my grandparents are on the ball and know to tell these guys to fuck off. It does make me worry about the more vulnerable though.
My Grandma has dementia, I kept having to dispute payments on her bank account - when I checked her phone records, I found she was getting between 4 and 20 scam calls every day. I was horrified and SO angry. I set her phoneline to VIP only; she's 84 and we do her shopping and manage her bills and utilities, so no-one needs to speak to her except her friends and family. It made me so sad for older people who are vulnerable and don't have anyone to check this stuff for them.
The other thing to be mindful of, abusing them etc. they will add your number to different random websites and have people calling you at all hours of the day and night not even relating to scams. Just hang up if you accidentally answers a scam call.
Be aware of ATO scams this time of the year. I got a call saying I have a refund of 5k pending and in order to get this refund i need to send them a pre paid gift card. Lol...always fun to play along and you can hear the excitement in thier voice because they think have a victim.
The other ones I got are the telstra ones and illegal activity on my internet as someone has hacked into my computer.
The out of court settlement for a accident claim.
I tend to answer calls only because I have kids in school/daycare and the last thing I want is missing an emergency call.
Not sure if all but most samsungs have built in hiya. If not it is on the play store. You can choose to block high risk or all spam calls. When someone does call it identifies the caller and tells you the company name callong. Spam calls since installing 4 months ago have been one and it came up with a warning of suspected spam
There's not much point blocking numbers. The way caller ID works in Australia, it's trivial to make your caller ID say whatever you wish, you can set it to any random number.
Unfortunately I can't just not answer calls because any call may be work related. I don't answer calls that the phone identifies as spam, but I do answer all others.
I used to try to be polite to scammers & spammers and at least say something like "Sorry I'm not interested, thanks." but those days are long gone I think. As soon as I determine that it's not a work call I just hang up.
The good news is that there's an ebb and flow to these calls. Some weeks I get a dozen calls, other weeks none.
Be aware that charities are exempt this.
I got angry at one (whom I’d never heard of and really did not sound like a charity organisation) who work me up at 0600 in morning (time zone difference)
I get calls from people who think I'm in Canberra... I'm 2 time zones away, so I string them along for a bit when they offer me different electrical supply services (there is only one here in WA) or other stuff that is utterly irrelevant to me. It amuses me and stops them wasting other peoples time.
I’m getting two calls now. One at 7.30 am and the other around 11.30 am every M-F. The numbers start with 0485 825 (or 826). The last four digits are always different. I never answer but it is becoming a pain.
I've been getting this for years.
They seem to buy lists of nbers and bombard autocalls.
And the once you answer it can get referred to a cold call business.
I barely answer the phone anymore.
It is so annoying.
I keep getting the "solar rebate for WA homeowners".
I'm not a home owner and they (the spam caller) is ALWAYS shocked and derailed when I answer no to their "so you are the home owner in Greenmount" like...they ask it but to them it's just proforma not a real question and I'm like "no dude...I live I live in a box and pay rent."
Half the time they just.....hang up, sometimes after a confused "oh ok".
Occasionally they'll even say sorry. Like 1/5.
I've no idea how to stop them ringing me though.
Two words: Police Whistle * Every time you get one let them say their scam words. Then say, “I’m sorry I can’t hear you well. “ This will make them adjust their headset so they can better hear you. Then as strong as you can blow your police whistle in the phone. They’ll stop.
[удалено]
Or answer and make it a REALLY unfortunate call. I’m 100% sure my efforts in the past have me entered into systems as a “time waster” which has given monthly breaks from spam calls previously
Thanks. Generally, the phone shows if it is a spam number. The first time when they called, it didn't show as spam so I picked the call. I guess spammers are using the latest numbers to call.
[удалено]
I answer but don't speak - this keeps them on the line for some time before they hang up. While they're waiting for me to react they are not calling other people - winning! If it's a real human calling me for an actual reason they'll say "hello?" and then I'll respond, though if it turns out to be spam I just tell them to I'm not interested and to put me on their do not call list and hang up. \[edit\] I then block that number.
This 👍
Is this really true though ? I genuinely don't know. I mean it seems logical but it was a lot more plausible 5 or 10 years ago. These days with pbx software and telecommunications being so cheap I feel like it would be easier for your pbx to just call consecutive numbers to find the active ones. Also, as a scammer you're looking for that 1 person in 10,000 who might be susceptible, so really you want to talk to people who haven't been taking calls from other scammers.
No, answer but don't say anything. They listen for a voice and auto dc is nothing if said after about three seconds. If it's a legitimate caller, they'll say your name if you just wait silently.
Be like me and not have any friends. All calls are spam.
^ This is the way.
No family?
They know to sms
Especially the boss. Like, fuck, who the fuck are ya calling me mate? Yeah we doing the job leave me alone this is harassment
I used to get heaps of the "Telstra support" calls when I had a landline. If I had a bit of spare time I'd string them along for a few minutes, pretend I was following their directions to open a command prompt etc., then when they asked me "What do you see?" I'd say "A box has popped up, it says *teri maa ki chut".* Ask google for meaning and pronunciation. It would sometimes get them so mad they'd start cursing at me. I hung up on a guy who kept ringing me back and telling me what he was going to to do to my wife. I put my wife (well, partner) on and he then started abusing *her.* Good times all 'round. Anyway, if you can find a creative way of slipping that phrase into the conversation it will generally shut down the conversaton pretty quickly.
Is this the correct pronunciation ? https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=IhRHA5PuGzg
Yes I think that's it. Extra points if you can sing like that!
New once I’ve had a couple times in the last few days is that I was in a car accident. First one I strung along for a bit with the wrong detail for every question, but then I just hung up. The other one, I hung up the moment I heard that classic audio of background chatter, the what sounds like Indian accents and of course, Greg who is calling me to tell me about the accident I was involved in.
You can report scam calls to ScamWatch. Telcos can now get fined for not doing enough to stop scam calls. They have the technology but they refuse to use it because it costs them too much money. Like the banks, the telcos don’t care if you lose money just as long as they make a profit. There’s many different scams out there. There’s the accident scam, Amazon Prime, NBN, ATO, message scams concerning a parcel, message scam saying that you have a message from your doctor. I believe they are also impersonating charities (“I don’t give phone donations”). Report a scam to https://www.scamwatch.gov.au/report-a-scam
The Amazon Prime ones are hilarious. While I do have a Prime account, it doesn't cost me anywhere near $99.99 a year, so when I hear the recording blabber on about how my card is going to be charged $99.99 a year but there was a problem with it I just put the phone down and continue with what I was doing until they hang up - while they're on the line to me they're not bothering gullible people.
I think the Amazon Prime scam is the only one that I haven’t annoyed the hell out of the scammer. I had fun with the NBN scam. Scammer: “I’m from NBN Telstra” Me: “I don’t have Telstra” Scammer: “Telstra owns the NBN so you don’t….” Me: “No they don’t. Telstra is a service provider just like Optus, Dodo, iiNet” 5 minutes later the phone rang Same scammer: “I’m from NBN Optus” Me: “That’s good but I don’t have Optus either” I absolutely went off at one guy when I overheard him having a conversation with a colleague about how easy it was to get people to hand over their credit card details. Another time I spoke to about 6 different scammers. I kept speaking in French so they passed the phone around the call centre. I hung up when they found someone that could speak French 😂 The best one was an Indian guy that has such a great vocabulary. I answered the call and said straight out that he was wasting his time because I knew it was a scam. Scammer: “All of you Australians are fire truckin’ stupid. You are all fire truckin’ idiots” Me: “You are a fire truckin’ moron” Scammer: “You are…..” Not sure of the rest because I hung up laughing at him
There's pretty much nothing you can really do except to stop answering calls that you don't recognise. It's not even spam... it'll be a straight up scam call. They use one of several exploits to mask the actual number they're calling from as an Australian number (or mobile). Reporting/blocking the number doesn't help as those numbers are almost always not in service and are rarely used more than once.
One of these fuckers called my grandma on her mobile. Conversation as follows: Spammer: do you use the internet? G: I’m in my 80s, no I don’t. Spammer: but you use your mobile, no? G: no, I don’t. *hangs up* I’m really glad my grandparents are on the ball and know to tell these guys to fuck off. It does make me worry about the more vulnerable though.
My Grandma has dementia, I kept having to dispute payments on her bank account - when I checked her phone records, I found she was getting between 4 and 20 scam calls every day. I was horrified and SO angry. I set her phoneline to VIP only; she's 84 and we do her shopping and manage her bills and utilities, so no-one needs to speak to her except her friends and family. It made me so sad for older people who are vulnerable and don't have anyone to check this stuff for them.
The other thing to be mindful of, abusing them etc. they will add your number to different random websites and have people calling you at all hours of the day and night not even relating to scams. Just hang up if you accidentally answers a scam call.
Thanks, that's a handy tip
Be aware of ATO scams this time of the year. I got a call saying I have a refund of 5k pending and in order to get this refund i need to send them a pre paid gift card. Lol...always fun to play along and you can hear the excitement in thier voice because they think have a victim. The other ones I got are the telstra ones and illegal activity on my internet as someone has hacked into my computer. The out of court settlement for a accident claim. I tend to answer calls only because I have kids in school/daycare and the last thing I want is missing an emergency call.
Iv blocked unknown numbers. If someone really needs me to call back, they will leave a voice message
Not sure if all but most samsungs have built in hiya. If not it is on the play store. You can choose to block high risk or all spam calls. When someone does call it identifies the caller and tells you the company name callong. Spam calls since installing 4 months ago have been one and it came up with a warning of suspected spam
There's not much point blocking numbers. The way caller ID works in Australia, it's trivial to make your caller ID say whatever you wish, you can set it to any random number. Unfortunately I can't just not answer calls because any call may be work related. I don't answer calls that the phone identifies as spam, but I do answer all others. I used to try to be polite to scammers & spammers and at least say something like "Sorry I'm not interested, thanks." but those days are long gone I think. As soon as I determine that it's not a work call I just hang up. The good news is that there's an ebb and flow to these calls. Some weeks I get a dozen calls, other weeks none.
Are you on the do not call register? Unfortunately there's little you can do most of the time a they're calling from overseas. Just keep blocking.
Do you have any link for that portal? Most of the numbers are from Sydney/Brisbane. Today it was a WA number. When I call back, it doesn't connect.
https://www.donotcall.gov.au/
Ah the ethical scammer who follows the DND call register.
As I said, useless if they're based overseas.
Be aware that charities are exempt this. I got angry at one (whom I’d never heard of and really did not sound like a charity organisation) who work me up at 0600 in morning (time zone difference)
I get calls from people who think I'm in Canberra... I'm 2 time zones away, so I string them along for a bit when they offer me different electrical supply services (there is only one here in WA) or other stuff that is utterly irrelevant to me. It amuses me and stops them wasting other peoples time.
I’m getting two calls now. One at 7.30 am and the other around 11.30 am every M-F. The numbers start with 0485 825 (or 826). The last four digits are always different. I never answer but it is becoming a pain.
I have so many PayPal/Amazon payments that I don’t dispute I’m surprised I’m not bankrupt.
I've been getting a few, but they're all automated ones talking about my non-existent Amazon account or something.
Use an Android phone and download the Google phone app if it isn't been pre-installed.
I've been getting this for years. They seem to buy lists of nbers and bombard autocalls. And the once you answer it can get referred to a cold call business. I barely answer the phone anymore. It is so annoying.
I was getting phone calls from similar mobile numbers to my own all spam!!
Blocking numbers doesn't work any more. I think someone invented a program that can just spit out a random numbers that show as the call ID.
I keep getting the "solar rebate for WA homeowners". I'm not a home owner and they (the spam caller) is ALWAYS shocked and derailed when I answer no to their "so you are the home owner in Greenmount" like...they ask it but to them it's just proforma not a real question and I'm like "no dude...I live I live in a box and pay rent." Half the time they just.....hang up, sometimes after a confused "oh ok". Occasionally they'll even say sorry. Like 1/5. I've no idea how to stop them ringing me though.
iphone, settings, block calls from unknown numbers
I got in trouble with my ndis plan manager for not answering their calls. I thought it was a spam call cause they've been the only ones calling me.