Is it frowned upon to....

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train boi Joined: 04 Nov 2008 Posts: 697

Is it frowned upon to get lads 070 personal redirect numbers shutdown? I know it won't earn me any icon or anything I just want the lads to receive some pain.

Also is it frowned upon to set up an 0871 number convince the lads to use it and when real victims call a voice message telling them its a scam and to stop further communication with the lad?

Posted: Sun Jun 21, 2009 10:26 am

Personally I would say it's OK. It won't ruin a bait and no ITPs are involved.

How would you go about doing it?

train boi Joined: 04 Nov 2008 Posts: 697

I have a range of 0871 numbers already so I can pick one record the message and do an ASEM saying I can offer numbers that victims will fall for (Although they have the warnings on them) hopefully stopping a few potential victims and stopping the scammers.

As for the 070 numbers, My Neighbour works for BT and has given me the list of abuse email addresses for these numbers so can send emails off and have them shut down, (Also supplying a copy of their scam email) much like the chaps do in the fake bank forum

Posted: Sun Jun 21, 2009 11:36 am

would you be able to get an 070 number shut down?
the authorities would presumably require proof, same as shutting down a fake bank.
but it would be hard for a company to filter out malicious complaints from reports about scammers,
because there is no proof except the scammer's email,
and a disgruntled employee could insert his boss' phone number in a scam mail.

[hah - i started writing this email an hour ago before any replies, then got distracted,
but the concern i mentioned is still a valid one i think]

train boi Joined: 04 Nov 2008 Posts: 697

Its a good question, Who in the UK with a saine mind would use an 070 number? No one really, and as like you do with alan and a fake site you need to present alot of proof, like scam emails etc, So I guess it would be hard to do a distgrunted employee act. Plus it costs upwards of 40p a minute to call these numbers and according to ofcom uptake of these numbers are low.

070 are personal numbers and not issued to mobile phones/landlines etc and you have to get one from companies like Y A C and C a l l s u r e they are not issued by Orange/Vodafone etc

Thanks for your question Smile

Posted: Sun Jun 21, 2009 10:40 pm

From 1 Aug 09, UK 0871 tel nos are to be reclassified from revenue-share tel nos to Premium Rate Service (PRS). Ofcom (the UK Regulator) tightly controls PRS and the use of a PRS tel no for what you describe may prove difficult.

Posted: Sun Jun 21, 2009 11:13 pm

Jay leno wrote:

Its a good question, Who in the UK with a saine mind would use an 070 number? No one really

well, i don't know who might use 070, hence my question.
but unless the answer is 'no one excepts scammers' then there is a risk of malicious complaints, yes?

This is how 070 numbers are marketed...
they may appeal to a narrow market, but they have advantages for legit users as well as scammers

Quote:

070 Phone Numbers

Thanks to this revolutionary new technology it is now possible to always be contactable on a single phone number even if your at work, home, on the move or even abroad! With an 070 number your calls will "Follow You" wherever you go!
How do 070 numbers work?

070 Numbers simply route calls to your current personal phone numbers, so when someone calls you on your 070 number their call is diverted to one or more of your current phone numbers this can include both landlines and mobile phones. 070 phone numbers are called "Follow Me" as if there's no answer on the first number the call can be re-directed to up to 2 others! How? >>

This could be your partner, colleague, secretary or another one of your personal phone numbers. Our 070 numbers can even be programmed on a time scale so that calls in the evening or weekend can be re-diverted to an alternative phone number or simply blocked. Show Me >>>
Bookmark us Customer login
070 Phone Number Benefits...

* You NEVER need to change your phone number ever again
* Day to day and time scale call diversion is available
* 070 Numbers keep your personal numbers private
* Only 1 phone number is needed to advertise making it clearer and cheaper
* Ideal for businesses with high staff turnover as 070 numbers can be easily re-routed

train boi Joined: 04 Nov 2008 Posts: 697

Again, another good question and point, But calls to 070 numbers cost upwards of 28.9p a minute (Source: BT and Orange PCS) In regards to "Ive only seen scammers use this number" I will run a poll to see if anyone has seen them for a legitimate purpose.

Agreed they have uses for legitimate users but it seems more lads use the 070 number range (click here and you will see the results show the illegimate uses)

@The Monsignor I only said 0871 as I was on my 0871 control panel, I have 0844/0845/0870/0871 and 0161 numbers that can do the same job.

I do understand r2d2s point of view, but we could flipside the question to a fake shipping site and say couldn't we shut a genuine site down? I guess the honour system on here would prevail more than anything

Posted: Mon Jun 22, 2009 10:18 am

Every day I see new people with 0470 numbers, they are always scammers but then I dont live in the UK so I only have opportunity to see the fraudulent use

For me, I guess there are advantages and disadvantes but first some questions:

Firstly, how much does it cost to set up an 0470 number? I was under the impression it was free, so no financial loss to a scammer by having it closed.

How long does it take to set one up, presuming the person setting it up has done so before? From what I know not all that long so time wise we are not costing the lad much by making him set up again

Obviously he will need to adjust his phone number in his scripts and tell a maga here and there he has a new number but again, not a huge inconvenience.

How many scammers 0470 numbers are publicly listed? presumably many thousands

How often does a 0470 number help to prove a scammer is in fact a scammer? for me, often, Scamwarners has many examples of this.

If a scammers number is closed, does the benefit outweigh the harm of not being able to search on that number and find a hit?

I dont really feel strongly either way, but just raising some things to consider, to me it is much the same as the question of if it is worthwhile closing a scammers dating profile, personally I wouldn't bother too much but wouldn't go out of my way to talk somebody else out of it

Posted: Mon Jun 22, 2009 10:28 am

You can get the numbers for free and yes, it takes about 5 minutes to set one up.

Baiting Guru Joined: 04 Jan 2006 Posts: 3193

There is low-usage and ofcom's definition of low usage:

Ofcom wrote:

We estimate that the number of 070 numbers in active use, based on information received from end users and PNS providers, to be around 1.25 million. We also estimate that approximately 940,000 are used by businesses and 315,000 by individuals. The average number of lines per business was five which suggests that some 190,000 businesses use personal numbers.

The traffic to 070 numbers compared to other ranges is relatively small. We estimate from data provided by originating communications providers (OCPs) that 070 traffic will be approximately 98 million minutes for 2008, whereas for 0870 and 0871 numbers, traffic was around 6,900 million minutes for the period April 2006 to March 20078. Most 070 traffic (approximately 55%) is terminated on a fixed network with approximately 15% on mobiles and 30% on other networks, such as international.

Therefore, in comparison to other number ranges the traffic for 070 is small. In addition, the data supplied by both PNS providers and OCPs show that 070 call traffic and revenues have been declining since the beginning of 2007.

Care to guess how much of that 30% is the scammers? Do Ofcom care?

Ofcom wrote:

In relation to advanced-fee fraud, Ofcom is not able to investigate cases beyond alleged abuses of numbering. However, Ofcom will consider on a case-by-case basis whether to refer such cases to other authorities (such as the City of London Police) who are better placed to handle.

No, they don't. Their definition of a scam involves number abuse - getting people to phone back and get charged loads, and so forth.

Ref: Review of the 070 personal numbering range (27 Feb 2009)

Posted: Tue Jun 23, 2009 4:36 pm

Jay leno wrote:

I do understand r2d2s point of view, but we could flipside the question to a fake shipping site and say couldn't we shut a genuine site down? I guess the honour system on here would prevail more than anything

sorry, i wasn't being clear here...

first, there is a big difference between phone numbers and sites.
a fraud site usually contains evidence of fraud and this can be checked by the webhost before shutdown.
the webhost does not have to take the baiter's word for it that fraud is occurring - it can check independently if it wants.
but for phone numbers there is only the baiter's complaint and an email quoting the number,
and the phone company cannot check any of that evidence independently.

i am not concerned that baiters will make the occasional malicious complaint.
my point is that a phone company is not likely to act on a complaint if it cannot verify that the complaint is well-founded.
i may be wrong, but i think their lawyers might be concerned about the risk of closing a genuine number,
because they have no way to differentiate between genuine complaints and malicious ones.

as i say, i may be wrong.
you might have contacts in phone companies who understand what we do here.

Baiting Guru Joined: 03 May 2007 Posts: 18313

When we shut down a fraudulent site, we request the hoster to investigate it and shut it down for violation of their own AUP/TOS. We supply them with the evidence of the scam/violations, which is verifiable. (We include links, look at the abuse report template in the fake banks sticky). The evidence is usually contained on the site itself or can be found in the data within the email facility.

You can sometimes get a site shut down by only sending an email requesting it be shut down, but if so that would be with a very cooperative hoster and likely because the hoster is doing their own research, not because they are acting solely the email.

Killing 070 numbers would be a bit different.

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