Every day you pass and receive phone calls without any worry. But do you know that a simple sentence on the phone can indeed cause serious problems. Here's how !
Mobile phone, internet ... technological progress seems to be a double-edged sword. On the one hand, it has made people's lives wonderfully easy, but on the other hand, it has opened the doors to the perpetrators for various types of scams especially regarding online communications. In this regard, police officers warn people to hang up as quickly as possible in case they hear such an ordinary sentence that it may be insignificant for them.
Indeed, nowadays telephone scams seem to be well in fashion. Besides, when you think you've gotten rid of all the hijacking tricks, you realize that's wrong: the crooks were able to tie up a new package of cheating.
But the acts of telephone scams date back a long time, they existed even before the mobile phones appear, except that currently, the latter are much more widespread and personal information is much more accessible with the presence of the internet. By the way, nowadays most people buy online, so phone numbers, addresses, credit card data, and e-mail addresses are not totally inaccessible for scammers.
As for the most recent telephone scam, it only involves a very familiar phrase: "Can you hear me?" but if the crooks were able to play the trick to several victims it is because it is such a common phrase that one often hears in noisy or agitated areas. That is why the authorities advise you not to answer the question by hanging up immediately.
The scammer's goal is to get his speaker to say "yes" so that he can record his voice and use this recording to make future purchases or to make financial transactions to your account.
Be aware that the word "yes" means a lot to some financial institutions or others that use the record for their online transactions with their customers. So when you say yes, the perpetrator can insert your voice approval on a script that he was able to shape himself using that as an authorization on your part to change your account data, make purchases in your name or even transfer money.
Here are instructions sent by the authorities to avoid this type of scam:
- Do not answer "unknown" numbers: change the settings on your phone so that all unknown calls go directly to voicemail but nothing to worry about! Fraudsters rarely leave voice messages.
- Avoid answering questions that ask you to say "yes" as for example: "Are you owner?" or "Can you hear me?" You can answer your turn by another question like "Who are you and why do you want to know?
- Simply hang up when you are not comfortable with a phone call, follow your intuition!
- Never transmit personal information over the phone to foreigners even if they claim to work for your automobile insurance company or financial institution.