Phone scams still have a bright future ahead of them. And for good reason, the crooks never stop competing in inventiveness to fool their victims. Their ultimate goal: to make you fall into their trap in order to rob you of your personal data or your money. One of the popular scams is to call you on your cell phone and tell you that a friend or relative has lost their cell phone and it is in their possession. Be extra vigilant and don’t play their game. Here’s how to protect yourself.
Receiving an unknown call – Source: spm
Beware of phone scams!
Calls from scammers posing as an acquaintance, friend or family member are common. The authorities are already trying to fight these scams, but more often than not, since these are harmless calls, we see nothing but fire and we can easily fall for the trap.
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One of the tricks used by scammers is to call you and make you believe that someone close to you has lost their mobile phone and that it is in their hands. They first ask you for your contact details to give it to you. But, the more they engage in conversation, the more they try to scare you by telling you that they are in possession of certain sensitive content regarding you. From then on, they try to blackmail you into sending them some amount of money otherwise they will expose your private data. Do not fall into the trap of this blackmail, it is a pure and hard scam!
In another scenario, you may receive a call from a so-called relative, who lives abroad and whom you have lost contact with for a long time: he will ask you for money to return home, because he’s stuck at the airport and can’t afford to get around. Or any other tall tale. Unfortunately, even if it smacks of a scam, many people fall for the trap and comply, much to the delight of the scammers.
How to thwart these scams? First of all, the first instinct to have is to immediately hang up the call and block this number. In addition, if your mobile phone allows you to report or denounce a fraudulent call, do not hesitate to do so immediately. This will help to permanently block the number and prevent the scammer from continuing to scam other people. Although, unfortunately, he can easily get another number and reoffend.
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Block a phone number – Source: spm
One of the best ways to block unwanted calls on a cell phone is to do it from the smartphone itself: just touch the number the call was made from and press Block/Mark as spam.
Another method: you can also download a call blocking application, which acts as a filter. There are various applications that perform this role, some are free and some are paid. Available on iOS and Android, the most popular of all is none other than “Truecaller” (free). It offers multiple advantages, such as caller references (name or company), since it collects all kinds of information from those who download it. Also, when you report a number as spam, if other people receive a call from the same number, the app will notify them immediately.
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