[I stuck this in Off Topic because I wasn’t sure what else it might fall under.]
TLDR Version: Always check the numbers displayed on incoming spam/scam calls before posting them. I’ve been doing that from the beginning, and I’m glad I do.
Something that happened today is a good example of why we do that. I got a call Monday that started out as {robo/AI) “Mary at American Senior Citizens Care.” From there it went to “Michael, with [company name withheld for now].” I don’t think his place of employment is anywhere in the USA.
He somehow had the notion that I live in Michigan, so I went along with that. I made up a ZIP code that I thought was in MI, and he said “So you live in Kankakee?” I’ve since found out the ZIP is for Shively, KY, but I agreed once more. After he had trouble pronouncing the fake last name I gave him, and/or decided I was trolling him, I got the “You have been kicked from this conference” thing.
I tried the originating number, and it was for an insurance agency in Florida. I called it several times, and no matter what numbers I pressed on their automated system, it kept going back to the main menu. I was thinking that was kinda unprofessional, and maybe they had some connection with the company name that “Michael” gave, but wasn’t sure.
This afternoon, I finally got around to trying that Florida number again. This time I got connected to a real person. In my Waldorf voice, I told her I’d had a call from Mary at American Senior Citizens Care, and she immediately said someone had “taken” their number and was “making prank calls all over the country.”
I switched to my real voice (listening to the recording, not really different from Waldorf), and asked if she had heard of the company that “Michael” mentioned. She said that was the first she’d heard of that, She also said her employer was working with someone to try to undo the damage done by the spoofed calls. My conversation with her was longer than the one I had with “Michael.”
Re the company name and domain that “Michael” mentioned, I looked at their website and their Facebook page. Neither has a location for them. The website appears to be a GoDaddy page. The Facebook page has one review, posted in Feb. 2022, which basically says “If you like lots of spam calls, go ahead and sign up with this company.” I haven’t been able to contact him, to see if he can tell me where the company is. The toll-free number on their website goes to a “not in service” message. They could be the culprit in the spam call I got, or just another victim of spoofing.
Whaddya think?