Scam calls - do BT make money?

TOPSie

I have subscribed to BT Call protect and this blocks all WITHHELD and Overseas calls. But I still get several calls a week which are scams. When I have to the time I go to my BT account and blacklist them. But today I have had exactly the same call as I blacklisted yesterday. When I looked yesterday's call came from an 0131 number and today from an 0872 number. Sometimes the call come from the same exchange, only differing in the last 4 digits.
The scammers are obviously utilising numbers in sets of 1000 (and old-fashioned Exchange - when they were all mechanical). But do the scammers actually pay for line rental like us poor consumers?
If so where is the incentive for BT to stop these calls as they are making money every time and call is made!!

littleboo

They are probably spoofing the CLI.

POPPYOSCAR

I kept another scammer busy the other day until he eventually told me to F off!!

Disgraceful that we can be abused like this.

Something needs to be done.

Ian011

It is important to remember that the number shown on screen is merely a "presentation number" and in some circumstances can be altered by the caller. The main use for this is for outbound call centres to present a central inbound telephone number for all callers to call back on, rather than showing the individual telephone number of the particular telephone line that originally made the call.

Scammers and fraudsters also have access to the same sort of facilities and often use it to set a fake telephone number as the "presentation number" in order to try to hide their tracks. The number may have too many or too few digits to be a valid number, may be a number in an unallocated number range, may be a number in an allocated number range but where the individual number isn't currently in use, or may be a valid and operational number that actually belongs to someone else.

The number shown on screen can never offer any sort of guarantee as to the identity of the caller.

Additionally, given the prevalence of "wangiri" missed call scams, it is not a good idea to call back to any premium rate numbers starting 084, 087 or 09 or to any international numbers as this could result in considerable call charges being incurred. Discretion is advised with all other numbers. Never call back to any number if you have no idea who you are actually calling and never take their word for it if they tell you who they claim to be.

Uxb

POPPYOSCAR wrote: »

I kept another scammer busy the other day until he eventually told me to F off!!

Although this sounds all very clever, in practice you are likely to have you number added to the list of those to be passed round to be rung even more in retaliation at trying to be a smart ar8se.

I would strongly advise people not to wind them up and try and waste their time but just to terminate the call and hang up.
I have had the same number here for several decades so the number is well and truly 'out there' - I get next to no scam calls at all - like maybe a couple a year. Ever wondered why?

superbigal36

Perhaps you have never been involved in an accident or had any PPI !!

littleboo

Conversely, you could argue that scammers exist to exploit people who are vulnerable to their lies so calling again someone who is clearly wise to their game is not good business. It would be great if terminating the call ultimately meant no more calls, but that isn't the case for most people I suspect. There is also the chance that the next time they dial, the person that answers next time is taken in by their spiel.