Security questions

Eyeful

DullGreyGuy I hope we agree on one important point:-
Scammers find it easy and simple to "number spoof" the phone number of a company. So you should never trust the phone ID that is displayed, as proof of who it is that is calling you.

Katiehound

A couple of times I have had a similar calls from Halifax fraud dept who couldn't understand why I would not go through my security details with them. Even when I argued that they could say that they were anyone- including Halifax!  

I ended up phoning them back and lodging a complaint. We are told not to talk to scammers and yet the bank follows the same pattern!!

(They were not calls that I was expecting)

boingy

I agree that scammers can spoof phone numbers but that's no reason for banks to avoid using their proper number in calls. 

km1500

quite a lot of bank (and other numbers) are on a list so they cannot be spoofed. 

DrSyn

All the programs I have watched about scammers, tell their viewers not to trust "phone caller id" as proof of who is actually on the other end of the phone line.

Please km1500, explain to me why the phone numbers on this list you mentioned cannot be "spoofed" by a scammer and where it can be found. Thank you.

masonic

DrSyn said:

All the programs I have watched about scammers, tell their viewers not to trust "phone caller id" as proof of who is actually on the other end of the phone line.

Please km1500, explain to me why the phone numbers on this list you mentioned cannot be "spoofed" by a scammer and where it can be found. Thank you.

It would be possible for network operators to effectively strip the caller id when connecting the call so that it would show as a withheld number. This would also affect the genuine number if it were in use for outbound calls. Seems like a good idea, so if it is being done, then great, that will stop scammers using those numbers fraudulently, but if you are called and something does display on caller id, it should not be trusted.

TheBanker

km1500 said:

quite a lot of bank (and other numbers) are on a list so they cannot be spoofed. 

There is a list that banks and organisations can register their numbers with to prevent spoofing, but at the moment it's not fool proof.

One reason it isn't 100% effective (there are others) is that banks actually spoof their own numbers on outgoing calls so you see the number they want instead of some random landline number. So some numbers cannot be added to the list because it would block genuine calls. There's also the fact that calls can originate from outside the UK, and there are many telecos involved in routing calls.

I will repeat what I said before - never rely on the caller ID to verify the origin of a call.