Phone Caller ID does not work

Just a heads up, number spoofing makes it useless

**LINK**

Edited By Ady1 on 03/05/2021 16:30:51

Old news I'm afraid, this has been going on for years. A new twist is making automated calls using an actual local, and therefore trusted, number.

Today, what looked like a Grimsby number said that my Sky broadband would be disconnected in 24 hours.

That will be as difficult for them as disconnecting my BT broadband, since I use neither!

Just DON'T press 1 to discuss!

Howard

It will not stop until there is a change in legalisation will this happen doubt full to much money rapped up in it

H

If i see a number i do not recognise. One of 2 things. If it says a No from afar. Abroad or London i do not answer. If a more local No i pickup & stay silent. If genuine someone will say something. Most of the scams just cut off if it does not hear a voice.

Steve.

I got one from DPD yesterday.. the usual,, DPD will redeliver today as long as I pay £2.99 fee via the link, yeah like I'm going to fall for that one ..yet another oldie again!

George.

A new one on me -

'Hello I am your local energy advisor and I understand you are the householder'

My reply - if you understand I am the householder - what is my name?

Phone silent.

I told him what I thought of him and his type and put the phone down.

Edited By Nick Clarke 3 on 03/05/2021 17:51:58

Not only a change in legislation but enforcement of said legislation. And that's the rub if most of the calls are from outside the country.

This is really old news on this side of the pond (Canada) Has Auntie been asleep all these years? The callers invariable spoof local area codes so as to look like something you might want to answer. There was some legislation recently passed to outlaw that, which has made absolutely zero difference - unsurprising when the calls originate in South Asia and the governments there can't/won't do anything.

The only way is to hit the telephone companies and make them responsible for the spam/scam calls they carry.

It sounds as though the rollout of VOIP technology for the phone network will solve the caller display problem but it could be a while coming. There are various units that can block or interrogate callers to minimise the unsolicited call problem.

Mike

The problem is that as long as Plain Old Telephone Service still exists, the protocols underlying it cannot be upgraded, because they have to work internationally and also do all the tedious stuff like getting calls to the right place and make sure the right person gets billed, and an upgrade means the entire world must upgrade at once. Once POTS ceases to exist, and phones become entirely VOIP, the protocols to fix this already exist.

At a national level there are a few things that are being done: one is to block caller ID from numbers that are guaranteed never to originate phone calls, though how effective this will be I'm not sure. Banks and the like have no interest in solving the problem of identifying themselves to customers: last time I got a call from them, I picked up the phone to someone who asked "Is this Calum? What's the first line of your address? And the postcode?"

Letting the answering machine screen your calls is pretty effective.

Most spam callers don't respond to the machine message and give up or try to talk over the machine so around 90% of the time its pretty obvious that its spam. There are a few that will leave a message but, so far, all the ones I've had are celarly spam. Like most folk I have a pretty good idea of who will legitimately ring me.

Going mobile only for voice and getting folk into the habit of using E-Mail also cut the spam calls signifcantly. I'm down to about 2 a week from maybe 20 - 30 when I regularly used the land-line. Downside is lots of E-mail gruff to deal with but highlighting 30 or so at a time and hit delete twice a day takes very little time.

I went mobile only when the Giff-Gaff SIM only deal with unlimited minutes and more data than I would ever need got cheaper than unlimited anytime calls from BT.

Clive

It won't. VOIP is almost certainly the technology that the callers are using to generate the spoof numbers.

Part of the problem is that there are legitimate reasons for the Caller-ID to differ from the number originating the call. Firms want their switchboard number to show, not the home phone of the person working from home. Doctors & Hospitals want to use the reception number not their private lines.

So the technology will always have the capability - and the bad guys will simply use it.

My VOIP provider lets me choose what caller-id is sent when I make a VOIP call - I have to prove that I legitimately own the number before I can add it to the list - but I currently have the VOIP number, my landline number and my mobile numbers as possible choices.

Not if you have someone in the house who cannot not-answer a ringing phone.

Seems to be a psychological thing, even if it's a 95% chance of being a spam call they still pick it up

I've had the "Why don't you answer that?" line. My reply is I don't know who it is which is followed by "Then answer it and find out". I just point out that a legitimate caller will either leave a message on the answering system, call again or try another contact method such as mobile numbers or email, I also have had to point out that not answering it would be the situation if there was no one about to answer the phone anyway so it will not seem rude to the person calling when it is not answered.

Martin C

But not picking it up that means there is a 5% chance of missing an important call.

Yes Martin and Sandgrounder, I've gone through that nonsense with my late wife and used to tell her that if you think it could be important/you want to find out who's calling, get on and answer it then! No pressure now, observe display, recognise no., pick up.Dont recognise no., wait for answer phone to cut in, recognise no., pick up. Ignore altogether if I'm peeling veg for dins, cooking, eating, watching something more important on TV, etc. Downside is if Dr calls leaving no number to call back. End of the line in more ways than one when my current landline contract expires.........

I have caller display. I also have a set of landline telephones which I have programmed to display the names of all the people who may wish to telephone us. The result is that international calls, calls showing just a number and no name, and calls showing number withheld are treated as spam and not answered. The telephones that we use are made by Panasonic but I imagine that there will be others giving the same facility.

As far as organisations, eg doctors, go, there is apparently an argument over privacy, however, my local area health authority appears to have got over this by using a single number from our nearest city, even though said city is 27 miles away. The result is, that as long as all the different sections use that number, all we get is a display showing "NHS" or similar. Unfortunately, not all health boards are sufficiently clued up about it, eg, our local cancer group has recently been taken over by a health authority 90 miles away, and they come up as number withheld or equivalent.

Regards,

Peter G. Shaw

I seem to have fewer spam calls than in the past, though they come and go in vague spells.

I think that's from the callers knowing they have not fooled me. Someone once told me the agents who circulate everyone's personal details "blacklist" those who won't co-operate. I have no idea if that is true, but it is plausible.

My 'phone does not display the calling number.

I bought one that will, but discovered it has a mains power-supply that has to be left switched on, and the call-blocker itself is an extra BT service. I concluded the occasional annoying silent, recorded or "Is that Mr. Grar-Hamm? " calls were not worth the extra expense.

I am staying with my broadband landline and PAYG, very basic portable, telephones. I briefly had an EE (BT-owned, ironically) "smart-phone" and broadband contract but reverted to BT Broadband when I realised the EE contract was more expensive and a "smart-phone" no use to me.

In view of all this, the occasional silent calls and recorded lies are really just a minor irritation.

===

I have just made an appointment for a telephone physiotherapy consultation, and the receptionist warned me the number would be withheld. It was only later that I realised I would not know that unless for some reason I miss the call!