We have a minor problem with the phone line, and I called Verizon. I reached a woman with a heavy indian accent, who listened to my problem and told me she would forward my call to the person who could help. But before she would do that. she wanted to tell me they were running a promotion, and I had won a gift card.
She asked to confirm my name and address, which I grumbled at, and said she should have that info since she had my phone number. But I gave her that info. Then she asked for my birthdate, to verify I was over 18. I refused, and asked to be transferred. She insisted. I said I would not give it to her, as I thought I might have dialed the wrong number. She hung up on me.
I called Verizon again, and got an automated voice system. I obviously DID dial the wrong number the first time.
I hear my dad’s voice in my head, whenever the phone rings. “Don’t give out any information!” he’d yell. This was the '70s. He was ahead of his time.
Given that, all you gave was your name and address. It’s redundant info to the scammers, because you can get it from the phone book, or at least in Arizona, the country registrar’s office website.
Can you check what number you called? (cellphone?)
I’m sure that’s deliberate. I bet the scammers got all the “one number off” numbers.
Hey, at work we get constant reminders not to fall for scam emails, and sure enough, I accidentally clicked a link in what I thought as a work email (clever people!). Fortunately our firewall caught it before I did any damage but still, I should have known.
They have your name and address, which are all public information, and easy to get from county tax records, voter rolls, etc. Now they also have a phone number associated with that address.
I’m not sure what actual damage they can do with just that information. Sign you up for some catalogs, call you about your health insurance?
If your bank, who they don’t know, will grant access with just that information, then you had a problem before the call. That shouldn’t be enough information to apply for a credit card or anything like that.
My company’s 800 number is very similar to another company’s 800 number.
We get their calls nearly every day. I clearly say OUR company’s name when I answer, but they do not seem to listen. I have had to cut people off mid-sentence when they tried to give me a credit card number.
Our company’s bank of numbers was one off from a hospital’s by only the overlay area code (so 404-312-xxxx and 678-312-xxxx). Almost every single day for years someone in our DEPARTMENT would get a call from someone who refused to believe they were not talking to the radiology, hematology, etc. department at the hospital. This happened occasionally even after the hospital was closed.
We had as part of our orientation instructions NOT to engage in hijinks with people calling for the hospital. Apparently, before my time, someone had pranked a caller and put her into some serious mental distress. Fortunately there was no social media in those days (the internet was young).
When I was a wee lad, our home phone number was similar to that of a nice restaurant. My mom usually answered the phone and would end up conversing with some other woman about what great food they had, what each would order, the weather, etc.
On the rare event when one of these calls occurred when my parents were out, I’d use my best maitre d voice and take the caller’s information, jotting it down so I could repeat it back. A bad boy, I was.
I almost fell for a similar self-dialed scam lately.
I was trying to call my credit card company about a problem. The number given on the bill was 855-xxx-xxxx. I dialed 1-800-xxx-xxxx.
Like the OP, I got a person right away, with a strong Indian accent, who cheerfully said they could fix the problem, but then started asking for account information that they should have already known, and then asked for personal financial info. So I hung up on them.
So now it seems that if you call is answered by a real human instead of a computerized phone tree, it’s likely that you mis-dialed to a scammer!
This sort of thing happened long before the Internet came into being. James Thurber had examples in his short story “Destructive Forces In Life”:
"I know (a) man who was always being routed out of bed by people calling a certain railroad which had a similar phone number. “When can I get a train to Buffalo?” a sour-voiced woman demanded one morning about seven o’clock. “Not till two a.m. tomorrow, Madam,” said this man. “But that’s ridiculous!” cried the woman, “I know,” said the man, “and we realize that. Hence we include, in the regular fare, a taxi which will call for you in plenty of time to make the train. Where do you live?” The lady, slightly mollified, told him an address in the Sixties. “We’ll have a cab there at one-thirty, Madam,” he said. “The driver will handle your baggage.” “Now I can count on that?” she said. “Certainly, Madam,” he told her. “One-thirty, sharp.”
“Just what changes were brought about in that woman’s character by that call, I don’t know. But the thing might have altered the color and direction of her life, the pattern of her mind, the whole fabric of her nature.”
Registering of domains closely associated with other domains is typically called cybersquatting. I’m not sure if there’s a similar term for phone numbers. I would guess that’s less common since there is a limited set of unused phone numbers. Being able to get a phone number that’s one off from another number would be harder than just misspelling a company name as “berizon.com” or whatever.
If I misdial my cable company-- I forget by exactly what, but it’s an 800/866 error, or something-- I get a dish system with a recording that immediately launches into all the reasons why satellite is better than cable.
