One assumes the phone number wasn't a "toll free" one either.

This kind of ruse would be a good way to get incautious users to dial a premium-rate number.

There's a current scandal in the UK over television stations who've been abusing premium-rate dial-in numbers. The BBC, Channel 4, and ITV have all been treating people who've been induced to phone premium lines in unacceptable ways.

For example, they have been accepting calls they don't intend to use--telling people to dial a premium line to vote for a game-show contestant when they've already chosen the winner, and the callers can't possibly affect the result.

http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/uk/article1488735.ece

If supposedly above-board organizations like TV stations are doing such things, is it plausible that spammers are not? Certainly there's a lot of mobile phone text message spam in the UK that's aimed at getting people to ring premium-rate lines.

I get the poorly made fake calls a couple of times every week. A very slow-speaking voice, ennunciating carefully: "Please call . It is VERY IMPORTANT (their emphasis) that you return this call as soon as possible." Never any company name given, and after a couple of months of calls with an authoritative woman's voice, they tried a deep, stern male voice. I was wondering what it might be, but I knew it couldn't be anything good. I deleted it the first time I heard it just because it sounded so specious.

The world of the internet makes me think about security differently. But this may cause Catch-22 problems when I am called. "This is the Red Cross?" "This is the IRS" "This is Bank of America?" How can I be sure? They want to confirm that it is really me, but how do I confirm that it is really them? The only way is to look up their telephone number in the phone book or on their website and call them, but you'll never get to the same person that has your case or whatever.

Perhaps this would be a welcome end to telemarketing??!?! One can always hope. I did get a legitimate (I think) series of calls (one per day) from a collecting agency about an outstanding parking ticket. Their messages sounded so much like a phishing scam I didn't want to call backm but did after months of these phone calls. Of course, they couldn't do anything without asking me my license plate number, which I shouldn't have told them.

I received that email, but it seemed odd so I checked my browser history for the website listed in the e-mail. No website was visited during the time in which the e-mail was received. I then did a search of the telephone number via search engine yahoo.com, but nothing came up. I then searched for the website listed in the e-mail and found this posting which descibed the same situation. I just want to say thanks for having this site and for having this information available.

here in australia - there's an epidemic of emails - purportedly from our leading banks - asking us to click on their ( supposed bank)website to right some wrong or to claim some money in our bank accounts - never a dull moment it seems.

Instead of being lured into giving info away, why dont folks simply respond with "I'm an adult over 21 - what I buy with MY credit cards is MY business" or simplest of all, review your credit card statement online and dispute any charges you didnt make? If folks understood how to use their credit cards etc or how online purchasing works (including disputeing charges and their rights as credit card holders) they would not click links, respond to e-mails, or give personal info away over the phone to anyone with whom they themselves did not initiate true and correct contact!! I get a dozen or so phishing e-mails a month but when "BB&T" says my account is delinquent and I must fix it immediately, I know that I should ignore it because 1. I can go to www.BBandT.com to see my account status myself (so I probably would know about a problem before they had a chance to tell me about it) and 2. I dont even HAVE a BB&T account (and if I did they would know my name and account number, not refer to me as "Daer BBnT accountmember:" OR ask for my account number, OR route their e-mails through Nigeria or Romania)

Terry, when I get those calls, I tell them that I dont give out that information over the phone unless -I- called them. I have had a couple provide me with -A- number to call (not necessarily -THE- number though - but most get irrate and hang up. If I want to be sure that it is THEM on the other end of the phone, I dial the number on the back of my credit card, bank statement, or look them up on their ACTUAL web site (usually under "contact us").