ATLANTA – Irritating robocalls from numbers disguised to look like the call is from your neighbor is becoming an epidemic.
It’s illegal, and it’s happening nearly every day.
The Federal Communications Commission calls it “neighbor spoofing.” It happens when telemarketers uses technology to manipulate the caller ID so it appears the call you’re getting looks like it’s local. Sometimes, the scammer makes the number look a lot like your number, with the same area code and prefix.
“Once you’re tricked into answering the phone, you can become a bigger target for more robocalls,” says FCC Chairman Ajit Pai.
Why is it happening so often?
Scammers make the call appear local to increase the chances that you’ll answer. Once you do, the scammer knows you’ve got a working number. They sell that number to others or use it to bombard you with marketing calls and other unwanted sales pitches.
The “Do Not Call” registry doesn’t block these calls. That system tells legit, law-abiding telemarketers that you don’t want their calls.
The scammers don’t care.
The FCC says don’t answer calls from numbers you don’t recognize. Instead, report them to the FCC.
Pai says the FCC recently fined a Miami telemarketer $1.2 million for making 96 million robocalls using neighbor spoofing.
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