Mobile phone scam !!

[GDW]

Please be aware of this latest scam affecting mobile telephones (hopefully not glen)

Received from Thames Valley Police:

The Force has received information of a telephone scam which is currently in operation. On answering your phone you will hear a recorded message, as follows:

"Congratulations. We are calling to advise you that you have won an all expenses paid trip to an exotic destination. Please press 9 now to hear further details."

WARNING - if you do press 9 you will be connected to a premium rate line that bills in the region of £20 per minute. If you press 9 and connect, even if you disconnect immediately, the other end will stay connected for a minimum of five minutes. This will cost you £100 and lasts for 11 minutes. The final part of the call asks you to key in your postcode and house number which can lead to other serious consequences. Then finally after a further two minutes the call responds with a message saying "Sorry, you are not one of the lucky winners".

Thereafter disconnecting you adding another £260 to your bill.
Unfortunately the calls are originating from outside the UK and BT and other telephone companies are relatively powerless to act. The safe solution is to hang up before the message asks you to press 9.

Whether BT will refund the cost of the call is another thing......

 

[Tom]

Even if I did press 9, theres no fucking way I'd pay anything to the operator, unless I was warned in advance of pressing that '9' button.

 

[GDW]

If you 9 you dont have a choice .

 

[Testin da Cable]

heh read all about this earlier this week. there's an article refuting it on theregister.co.uk (but that site is down now it seems )

 

[xane]

You can checkout the Thames Valley Police website for confirmation (there isn't any), but this gets the bullshit-o-meter ringing loudly for me, but the closest Urban Myth I can get is this one.

 

[Testin da Cable]

it is indeed BS. BT respond in the article on la reg that it isn't possible to get a 20ppm charge. relax (and hope the register get their site back in order heh)

 

[ECA]

TVP have posted fale tech information before.

 

[Tom]

Originally posted by GDW
If you 9 you dont have a choice .

Oh yes I do.

 

[Testin da Cable]

aaaaaaand.....here's the link to the reg's article

 

[Cloowwwnnn]

ICSTIS urges any individual or organisation that receives an e-mail about this scam to delete it immediately. Please do not forward it on to others

OK?! Close, lock, delete!!

 

[Tom]

I heard about this video that if you watch it and with some freinds then 7 days later if you alone you get killed by this giel who comes out of your tv and she gets your friends as well and the only way to get rid of her is to make a friend watch the video then the curse goes away but i dunno if it does or not cos im confused but anyway im not dead so I think im right

 

[Cdr]

No wonder you made me watch it!

You bastard.

5 and a half days left

 

[evilmonkeh]

my dad got a letter from sky about this:s
sounds like shit
how can someone call you, and then that call be changed into a self charging call?

 

[WPKenny]

There are fixed rates for premium rate calls. There's no 20 pound per minute call charge.

What I have heard about is the ability to make a one off charge for the call. But AFAIK there's no way YOU can call someone up and charge THEM for the priviledge.

 

[Xtro 2.0]

lol its xmas and here come the spam mails full of the same retarded bullshit that every year the office pricks go "ooh look, smell this perfume and you will be anally fisted/use this cash machine and koreans will sew a penis on your hand" etc and the SAME FKING MORONS DONT SEEM TO REGISTER ITS ALWAYS THE SAME SHIT AT THIS TIME OF YEAR.

Hmmz, can you tell we've had these going round at work?

 

[Xavier]

* petitions for GDW to make a public retraction and apology* *











* or not - but still

 

[Testin da Cable]

imo GDW did a good thing(tm) (why can't I ever remember what the alt-code is for (tm) btw)

the bad thing is as Xtro says: having several dozen secretaries and colleges mail you that the latest virus/scam/baby is in only to have you debunk that for them all to mail you again that it's been debunked. jeebus teeth gnashing christ that's enough to make you inflict violent pain on the nearest mortal.

 

[GDW]

What, an apology for being naive. Fuck off

 

[Xavier]

heh, rule number one, before posting warnings, google the keywords. I've never found a genuine warning in my email, after minor googlage they always turn out to be hoaxes.

If nothing else, I'd discount it on the fact that the maximum toll on a premium rate line in the UK is £1.50, to get £200+ out of you you'd need to be on the line for over 2 hours, and if you're stupid enough to do that you deserve to be reamed for far more...