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PIs Selling Phone Records Sued By The FTC

Posted by ryuzaki0 on from the argh-my-records dept.

carl writes "According to an MSNBC article, the FTC has sued five different background investigation firms for selling confidential phone records." From the article: "In the lawsuits announced Wednesday, the FTC charged the companies used 'false pretenses, fraudulent statements, fraudulent or stolen documents or other misrepresentations, including posing as a customer of a telecommunications carrier' to get the phone records. The companies advertised on their Web sites that they could get the confidential phone records of any individual and make them available for a fee, the agency said."

1 of 79 comments (clear)

  1. SBC gives this stuff out for free by pestilence669 · · Score: 4, Interesting

    Call the SBC's DSL department and claim to be a friend "helping" someone install their DSL modem... but insist that you don't know the address or anything else. Be as dumb as possible on the phone. Get a little drunk if you can't be convincing.

    Often, the customer service reps will read back the entire address, and sometimes, even the last for digits of the SSN. I found this out when I was ligitimately calling them because of a line problem.

    I never had any problems adding service, removing service, or getting personal account information... all without identifying myself whatsoever. Need an address for a telephone number, call SBC and tell them you want DSL. The phone reps will "verify" your address by reading it back. Awesome, huh?