Beware One Ring Phone Scam

Better Business Bureau ^ | January 30, 2014

[Second Amendment First]

If you receive a call on your cellphone preceded by just one or two rings, chances are it’s part of the new One Ring phone scam spreading across the U.S. faster than a summer wildfire.

Here’s how it works: International scammers have programmed computers to blast out millions of calls to cellphone numbers, ring once or twice, then disconnect. The objective is to make you curious enough to dial that number back.

The “gotcha” happens when you return the call. You’ll be charged $19.95 for the international call fee itself and $9 per minute thereafter. “Oftentimes consumers say they hear music and then advertising, so they think nothing of staying on the phone. It’s easy to see how quickly charges for these international calls can add up," said Shelley Polansky, vice president of communications for Better Business Bureau Serving Northern Colorado and Wyoming

Consumers who have been duped by these calls report calls coming from Dominican Republic (809), Jamaica (876), British Virgin Islands (284), Grenada (473) as well as Minnesota and Canadian area codes.

If you think you’ve are a victim of the One Ring scam, you should immediately alert your phone carrier and keep an eye on your cellphone bill. If you have not already done so, opt out of all third-party billing to your phone.

[Second Amendment First]

I had a call from 268-762-0023 this morning and it rang twice. I don't answer unknown calls but often google them to see who's calling. Crooks who do this should be castrated.

[tomkat]

Crooks who do this should be castrated

Three or four times, piecemeal-ish.

[latina4dubya]

i do the same thing when i get calls from unknown numbers... this past week i have received 3-4 phone calls from weird 4-digit numbers... like 1003, 2019, 3008, etc... of course, i did not answer, but i do wonder about the strange 4 digits...

[DannyTN]

"Crooks who do this should be castrated."

True but the phone companies need preventive measures on this type of activity.

• There should always be a warning that a line is a pay or international line before the call is connected.
• The money for such calls should be held in reserve for a month. And returned to callers if it appears there was abuse.
• A computer program could easily check to see if pay lines are calling customers and hanging up.
• The phone companies should prosecute the callers.
• And they should refuse to take calls and/or charge extra from countries that do not assist in the prosecution.

[Balding_Eagle]

Thanks for posting this.

[Second Amendment First]

Caller ID spoofing is the practice of causing the telephone network to display a number on the recipient’s Caller ID display that is not that of the actual originating station. The term is commonly used to describe situations in which the motivation is considered malicious by the speaker or writer. Just as e-mail spoofing can make it appear that a message came from any e-mail address the sender chooses, Caller ID spoofing can make a call appear to have come from any phone number the caller wishes. Because of the high trust people tend to have in the Caller ID system, spoofing can call the system’s value into question. Many people have claimed that, after answering a spoofed call, the charge for the call is larger than it would be for a legitimate call.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Caller_ID_spoofing

[Blood of Tyrants]

Thanks for the info.

[JimRed]

You’ll be charged $19.95 for the international call fee itself and $9 per minute thereafter. “Oftentimes consumers say they hear music and then advertising, so they think nothing of staying on the phone. It’s easy to see how quickly charges for these international calls can add up," said Shelley Polansky, vice president of communications for Better Business Bureau Serving Northern Colorado and Wyoming

Since the service provider who bills you has to send funds, there should be a trail leading back to the perp.

[MeshugeMikey]

Thank you.

I never return calls from numbers outside my area code that I dont immediately recognize.

[Darksheare]

With a deli slicer set to setting “one”.

[Squawk 8888]

Another good line of defence is to disable overseas calls on the account. With my carrier I can log in anytime to enable or disable the feature. This is especially important if it’s your kids’ phone.

[rktman]

If they don’t care enough to leave a message, I don’t care enough to call them back. As and aside, I’ve been getting a few emails from “se” with a note that says to “open attachement to see if I’m interested”. LOL! Yup. I’m gonna break my fingers rushing to open the attachment. NOT!

[Pit1]

Received this note from a friend and registered.

I’ve received a few unsolicited calls on my cell phone trying to sell something.  If you’re having similar experiences, click on the link below to stop those calls.  Yes, even for cell phones.

http://illinoisattorneygeneral.gov/donotcall/donotcall.htm

[Salamander]

Half the time, I don’t even call back the people I do know.

;]

[UCANSEE2]

click on the link below to stop those calls.

I did so last year. Now I get only the most bizarre unsolicited calls.

Like the one yesterday from PAKISTAN telling me the Microsoft Server was getting error messages from my computer, telling them that my computer was being used by hackers to attack other computers. And that it was ruining my hard drive. And there was no software I could get to fix it. That they would fix it for free, but there would be a charge of....

I guess you can tell how that went.

[Leaning Right]

the phone companies need preventive measures on this type of activity

I'm guessing that the phone company gets a slice of all fees billed to your phone. So they have very little incentive to take action here.

[Biggirl]

My cell phone early this week stopped a cell phone from processing a call.

[DannyTN]

"I'm guessing that the phone company gets a slice of all fees billed to your phone. So they have very little incentive to take action here."

You're probably right. But if so, then that's a scenario where we need government intervention. Government regulations wouldn't be necessary if companies always did what was right.

[Carpe Cerevisi]

[IYAS9YAS]

Got one the other week. I don't answer calls from numbers I don't know, and I certainly don't answer calls from area codes unfamiliar to me.

That being said, one nice feature of my smart phone told me the call was from the Dominican Republic, so I certainly wasn't picking up. I do the same thing, unfamiliar number, no message or weird message, or something related to an account, I look it up first.