Scammers have gotten pretty good at making their schemes look real. One reason consumers fall for the crooks trick is because of a little thing called phone spoofing. Have you heard of it before? It’s an elaborate phone calling method which allows the scammer to use numbers which appear to belong to real businesses.
The scam works like this: the crook uses their favorite spoofing site, do an online search, many pop up. Once the thief is there they can select a phone number to call. They’re even given the option to type in a number they want the victim to see on the caller ID. This has been bad news for legitimate companies.
In the video above, KSL-TV producers demonstrate how the ploy can be used to trick a consumer. In their case they found a spoofing site, entered one of their personal phone numbers and then told the site they wanted the spoofing number to appear as 444-444-4444. In less than 20 seconds a KSL producer received a phone call from the 444-444-4444 number.
While it’s easy to place a spoofed call, it’s much more difficult to trace one. If you’re determined to track down the spoofer you will need a lawyer to subpoena all of the spoofing company’s records.
There are certain laws in place that say a spoofer cannot threaten anyone, use intimidation or use deceptive practices to get personal information but as you probably already guessed; scammers aren’t too concerned about what the law says.
