It appears the Turkish government has gotten involved listing these things. The first hit in the OP came from the İzzet Şükrü Enez Society Center, Google says is a non-governmental organization, but it’s using a government URL domain name.
My theory is, folks have been searching google for phone numbers for a long time, trying to find information relating to them. A group of spammers, probably entirely unrelated to the ones making the phone calls, have created sites with bogus phone number listings designed to entice people searching for phone numbers. The bad, improbable names might be intentional, as their ideal target is someone who is bright enough to google a phone number but not bright enough to notice these details, so they go to the site and see that they can get “extra info” about these bogus numbers by handing over their credit card.
There are very similar scams for “public records search” sites that will show you tantalizing information about the name you just googled but then when you fork over for the whole dossier the results are missing, wrong, or confusing.
Thanks, I hope so too. The odds are about 50/50, in terms of a ‘cure’. I’m realistic, I’ve shepherded enough patients through these situations over the decades.
Today’s spam callers, when looked up on Google, include Myprettyass Dhepyasuwan and Anonmouse Ibebunjo, as well as the more prosaic yet bizarre Jaxsuk Cankayatarim, Jhonchit Wallbridge, Ketuo Mcrer, and others.
Yesterday was the first time I have received a spam call from a foreign language speaker with a “local” number. She started speaking in some foreign language and I tried to interrupt to say “no hablar espanol” (correct/not correct saying?) but she kept right on a talking, then hung up. Had no idea what she was saying or wanted.
I eventually gave up and turned on my iPhone’s feature to not answer/notify on calls and messages unless they are in my contacts list; that really helped save my sanity.
I did notice a decent downtrend in these when, a year or two ago, a new rule/law/technology went into effect for cellular calls where the origination is somehow verified by the network.
Jeebus QtM, when did that happen? Did I miss the announcement? Hope this all works out for you.
On a lighter-hearted note, “Conchies Hugee” sounds like a great name for an adult performer. The only difference is whether it’s his conchies or hers that are hugee.
A couple months into retirement. Prostate cancer, Gleason 9, so a pretty aggressive one NOT one for watchful waiting. rad/chemo/hormone blocker rx works as well as surgery at my age, so I’m doing that. I’ve mentioned it in a few threads but didn’t really ‘announce’ it. From full time doctor to full time patient in a few short steps.
Ouch! Hope like heck this works out OK. Sending good luck & supporting thoughts your way.
I had a vaguely similar scare that, thankfully, turned out to be a false alarm. So far. Went from near-full time caregiver of my wife with stage 4 widespread visceral mets to widowed to being the pt getting a full workup for GI bleeds then leukemia in 4 months flat. Turned out it’s not GI bleeds nor leukemia, at least not diagnosable leukemia.
So back to watchful waiting for whichever surprise one’s aging body springs next.
The only bright spot was that I knew everybody who worked at the cancer clinic, so going there wasn’t as scary. Still, it’s a very different experience sitting in the familiar exam room with the barcode label on your shirt, not somebody else’s.
( I do not speak Spanish pronounced es-pan -YOL; there should be a “~” over the “N” pronounced “nee” as in “We are the knights who say ‘ni’!” Hablar is the infinitive, “to speak”. The first person pronoun “yo” is understood from the verb form first person singular, but “yo no hablo espanol” is also correct. Thank you Mister Frasca and Grade 9, 50 years ago now. If you watch the Neflix series on Pablo Escobar, it seems Latin America pronounces it “joe” instead of “yo”)
A couple months into retirement. Prostate cancer, Gleason 9, so a pretty aggressive one NOT one for watchful waiting. rad/chemo/hormone blocker rx works as well as surgery at my age, so I’m doing that. I’ve mentioned it in a few threads but didn’t really ‘announce’ it. From full time doctor to full time patient in a few short steps.
[/quote]Not to hijack the thread here, but Mr. Legend also joined this (kinda shitty, honestly) club almost two years ago. In April of '21, a year before hecplanned to retire, he had to have emergency surgery for a surprise femoral fracture; the CT scans they did pre-surgery didn’t show any suspicious masses and his last full physical in 2019 (including PSA test) was normal. They didn’t discover the cancer until the bone biopsy came back after his hip replacement, and a bone scan showed full skeletal involvement, from feet to skull. He’s been getting hormone suppression treatments and that’s stopped the progression for now. It seems like a dirty trick on someone who’s looking forward to an active retirement!
On topic for this thread, we feel compelled to answer calls from unknown numbers for fear of missing a call back from a hard-to-reach doctor or insurance office. It sure does seem like spammers have made a healthy recovery from the height of the pandemic.
You have my empathy, for sure. Life is what happens as we make other plans. Grabbing constantly for the phone to see what’s coming at you next ain’t fun either.