If you have received a mysterious phone call today using this RI number, please report anything you heard from a live caller, a recorded message, or call center chatter. Some of you have spoken to me personally on not-quite returned calls, and I have tried explaining what I think is happening. I will swear on any holy book that I've not placed a phone call using this number this whole day. You have been called by some cowards who want to take your money or your information, or whatever else they should not have. They have decided to "borrow" my phone number to help conceal their location and identity. The calls are ILLEGAL for spoofing my number and (I presume) abusing an autodialer for a sales purpose. If I am correct in my suspicions, any one of you can sue the buggers for relief if the true call source can be found.
Halfway into making my lunch I began taking complaints by phone at 12:32 Eastern. Over two hours later I have done nothing else but try to handle the problem. Thus far no one has learned a call purpose, and many of you are responding to calls you did not handle live, so you don't have any call audio either.
It's not clear as I write if the cowards are targeting specific regions, other than parts of Florida, from which a substantial percentage of complaints have reached me. I'm getting other complaints from California, Connecticut, Massachusetts, New Jersey, and Tennessee. Maybe there are more. I have yet to catch up with the call logs.
As to the call source and purpose, I have a few educated guesses, including the credit reprice crooks who supposedly want to "lower your credit card interest rate", a favorite racket since 2008. Some players in that sector are pretty active in Caller ID spoofing, as I've experienced when illegal callers try fooling me by abusing phone numbers within a couple miles of my home. But any other popular frauds are possible, like the medical "panic button" hawkers, alarm system sellers, and the medical insurance leeches pushing back and knee braces. I wish I knew for certain.
The greeting on my message recorder has been changed to reflect the above and ask everyone, as I've done here, to please share what you know. It would be helpful if you'd indicate your state or time zone and the time your call arrived. I am not interested in gathering extensive details of your life or swindling you for cash. Someone else is, and we cannot bring the hammer down on the jackals without good data.
If you have received a mysterious phone call today using this RI number, please report anything you heard from a live caller, a recorded message, or call center chatter. Some of you have spoken to me personally on not-quite returned calls, and I have tried explaining what I think is happening. I will swear on any holy book that I've not placed a phone call using this number this whole day. You have been called by some cowards who want to take your money or your information, or whatever else they should not have. They have decided to "borrow" my phone number to help conceal their location and identity. The calls are ILLEGAL for spoofing my number and (I presume) abusing an autodialer for a sales purpose. If I am correct in my suspicions, any one of you can sue the buggers for relief if the true call source can be found.
Halfway into making my lunch I began taking complaints by phone at 12:32 Eastern. Over two hours later I have done nothing else but try to handle the problem. Thus far no one has learned a call purpose, and many of you are responding to calls you did not handle live, so you don't have any call audio either.
It's not clear as I write if the cowards are targeting specific regions, other than parts of Florida, from which a substantial percentage of complaints have reached me. I'm getting other complaints from California, Connecticut, Massachusetts, New Jersey, and Tennessee. Maybe there are more. I have yet to catch up with the call logs.
As to the call source and purpose, I have a few educated guesses, including the credit reprice crooks who supposedly want to "lower your credit card interest rate", a favorite racket since 2008. Some players in that sector are pretty active in Caller ID spoofing, as I've experienced when illegal callers try fooling me by abusing phone numbers within a couple miles of my home. But any other popular frauds are possible, like the medical "panic button" hawkers, alarm system sellers, and the medical insurance leeches pushing back and knee braces. I wish I knew for certain.
The greeting on my message recorder has been changed to reflect the above and ask everyone, as I've done here, to please share what you know. It would be helpful if you'd indicate your state or time zone and the time your call arrived. I am not interested in gathering extensive details of your life or swindling you for cash. Someone else is, and we cannot bring the hammer down on the jackals without good data.