sundance-communications.com/forum Forums General General Telephone & Systems Information Strangest problem ever. Auto Calller with stolen client's phone #

Hello.

I have the strangest problem I’ve ever seen that I can't even begin to explain how or why this is happening. This is like something from the unsolved mysteries or SFI-FI channel but its real life.

The phone keeps ringing in my office maybe 20 times in the last hour.

When you pickup the phone, you hear a women's voice saying " I'm sorry, I must have dialed the wrong number" Click*

Always the exact same voice with the exact same message then it hangs up.

The strange and werid part is the caller ID is coming from your client list of numbers you actually know who call normally call daily.

One call from Texas

Now one from Florida, then from California,

Vermont, Seattle, Utah, etc....

All over the place but its the exact same women's voice over and over again but somehow they are able to mask their Caller line identification to match the number of people that have actually recently called you or number that you often call. This is the strange part! They are ALL PEOPLE YOU KNOW ON THE CALLER ID!

If you call the number back, you get the actual customer who acts like you are crazy when you explain the phone call you just got from their phone number. They will say like " I was on the phone with another call at the time or I just got in from lunch"

I would not believe it if I did not see it with my own eye. Does anyone have even the slightest idea on what could be going on here because I don't have a clue.

The only thing I can possible think of is that the phone company might have some type of auto dialing system to check trunk lines in order to verify they are operational.

Perhaps this system is malfunctioning and calling from a list of numbers and using the phone numbers of people who recently call. This does not make sense to me either but it the only thing I can come up with.

Think about this point.

1. Who else besides your phone company has access to your actually phone records and know the phone numbers of actually real people who call your office regularly?

2. The women voice is very quick apology and hangs up. They never ask for money or make any demands. The message last about 2 seconds. I don't know what anyone who have to gain from this.

3. I think you need a phone system with T1 lines and a good knowledge of how phone systems work to disguise send out phone number that does not belong to you.

Please tell me if you have any ideas on this insane issue. I am not sure how I am suppose to solve this mystery.

depending on the phone system it can be very easy. all the do is change the isdn info.

Here is a situation that happen today.

I would get a call from lets say the actual person:

John Smith
(846-555-8475)

Then 2 seconds later, the phone would ring again and say

John Smith
(846-555-8475)
However, this would not be John smith, its actually a voice recording saying " Sorry, I must have the wrong number" click*

Then a call from the real
Martin Jones
(212-555-4584)

Then 2 seconds later, I would get a call from
Martin Jones
(212-555-4584)

with the same voice recorded voice " Sorry, I must have the wrong number"

Does this sound like a phone hacker trying to gain access to our system or maybe a telephone company's testing device not working properly?

Something very strange is going on here and its a lot more serious then someone simple putting the wrong number on the CLI. This is being done with our own customer information and in real time.

I don't have a clue, but I did have a similar thing happen to me on my home line a few months ago. Several times (like five or more) over the course of two days, the phone would ring, no caller ID, and a voice at the other end says "aahh sorry, I have the wrong number...<click>". The weird thing is the voice was always exactly the same, like a recording. It sort of freaked my out like a Twilight Zone episode.

I guessed it was probably someone auto-dialing for valid numbers to sell a telemarketer.

That sounds almost exactly like what has happen with me. It was the exact same women's voice over the course of 2 days.

At first you think its an actual person and you are like " oh, thats ok" but then it happens again and again.

Everytime the exact same voice saying the exact same thing. Its must be a recording.

The really freaking part is in my situation they were using the previous caller ID information or Caller ID information from actually people who normally contact the company.

Its like something out of a freaky movie. Someone must be able to read the information connected to our PRI lines and use it as their caller ID during these calls or simple send a repete last caller ID number masking feature.

I really don't know if this exist but somehow something very strange is going on with these mystery phone calls.

Connect your Tri Corder in parallel with the phone line and have run an upside down bubble memory test.

What brand phone system do you have? Do you use any type of unified messaging or any other servers connected to your phone system? Where im going with this is, maybe you have a virus in a computer connected to you phone system.

any way you can anser one of those calls with a fax. Maybe if it hears a CNG tone the message won't trigger.
Is there a slight delay in hearing the message?

I agree with the last post. How they got the caller ID from your client, I dont know. but I would trasfer the call to a fax machine and see what happens. The problem with doing that, is now that person who called you may think your phone number is a valid fax and start sending you faxes to your phone number.

I've heard rumors of some CLID systems getting confused about calls with unknown ID's - I think it had to do with international cellular phones or something. Anyhow, I remember someone saying that there was a certain person who, when they called, caused the last caller's CLID info to show again.

This could be related, but it's definately a strange one.