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Spam targeting Google Voice?

Started by PennyCat, November 10, 2017, 07:32:52 AM

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PennyCat

Today I received a call from a "BTC INC" or some such, with my area code and prefix and different 4 digit extension.  It was a "pain management" spam call.  I never received such calls when I was Anveo.  Since it was using my area code and prefix, I suspect there is some sort of GV spam targeting going on.  Has anyone else experienced this before?

I get my e911 and CNAM from CallCentric if that adds anything.


SteveInWA

Hi:

This actually has nothing at all to do with whatever carrier you may be using.

It's a new scourge known as "neighbor spam":  the robocallers load an entire local telephone exchange (e.g. 415-86x-xxxx) into their software, and then, "spoofing" other numbers in that exchange, call everyone at random.  Their goal is to fool people into thinking it's a local business or neighbor trying to reach them about something legit, vs. seeing a far-away area code/prefix in the caller ID.

It's heinous, but there's not much you can do about it, other than to just not answer calls from caller IDs you don't recognize.  You could also set up Google Voice with a "whitelist" of approved numbers, and then send every other call to voicemail, but it's a hassle.

Taoman

After all these years telespammers finally found my free Callcentric DID number and I started getting all kinds of spam calls from the 845 area code. Since I have no reason to receive a call from that area code I made a call treatment that sends all callers with 845 area code to the "number disconnected" error message. Works great. Hasn't stopped them from trying though.

I did have to go to a whitelist only system with Google Voice. Since over 95% of my incoming calls are from one of my Contacts it wasn't hard to implement. Also went with an app on my Android to block all calls not coming from one of my Contacts. Works well and has made spam calls a thing of the past for me.

Of course this system won't work for people who frequently get valid calls from unknown numbers.