Free Republic

US regulators on Tuesday announced a nationwide crackdown to stop companies from inundating people with billions of unwanted and illegal robocalls and telemarketing calls. The crackdown, known as Operation Stop Scam Calls, involves the Federal Trade Commission and 101 other federal and state law enforcement authorities, including the attorneys general of all 50 states and Washington, DC. More than 180 enforcement actions and initiatives are part of the initiative, including five that the FTC formally announced on Tuesday. “We don’t know too many people out there who enjoy getting scam calls,” Samuel Levine, director of the FTC consumer protection bureau,...

No one is immune from getting scam phone calls. Criminals, mostly in other countries, keep finding new ways to steal your money. Video above: See how a con artist does his work"It can even impact a former director of the FBI. Both he and his wife found themselves in the crosshairs of sophisticated criminals. “I was a federal judge,” William Webster said. “I was the director of the FBI, director of the CIA, and I was the target of an elder fraud scheme.” Webster served as director of the FBI from 1978 to 1987. Webster wants as many people as...

Few people still pick up phone calls from unknown numbers, but if you do you need to listen closely to what the person on the other end says. If you receive a call and immediately hear the phrase “Can you hear me?,” hang up. The phrase is used to coax you into saying “yes,” a word that, if said in your voice, is as good as gold for con artists.

Australians were conned out of more than $800,000 in November alone as a "tsunami" of scam phone calls threatened people with arrest if they did not hand over their personal details. ...