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Has My Cell Number Been Cloned?
2bepissedoff asks: "According to my T-mobile phone bill, I have been receiving incoming calls from a 'NBR unavailable', since February, with talk time ranging from 1 minute to an hour. The strangest thing is, I have never received these calls (my phone doesn't ring and I haven't talked to the caller). I only started noticing them when my phone bill was charged over $40 more than my regular bill. Of course, I have a family plan (2 people only, 2 lines) and I talked to my partner. The answer: he too had not received any of these calls, especially over 300 minutes per month of them. We called up T-mobile twice and claim the possibility of phone cloning. Both representatives hung up on me, thinking I was trying to con them or something. Any advice to what this could be?"
I did a little investigation and I've noticed that some of the NBR minutes overlap with calls I actually make. For example:
'2/22 at 3:28 pm "NBR unavailable" 17mins usage.
2/22 at 3:44 pm "-(# I made)---" 3mins usage.
So if you add up the time 3:28pm + 17 mins = 3:45 pm. The time when I made my call was at 3:44 pm. This reoccurs several times. I still do not think this is enough evidence to convince T-mobile of Phone Cloning. So I am thinking of switching either my number or my service provider. "
'2/22 at 3:28 pm "NBR unavailable" 17mins usage.
2/22 at 3:44 pm "-(# I made)---" 3mins usage.
So if you add up the time 3:28pm + 17 mins = 3:45 pm. The time when I made my call was at 3:44 pm. This reoccurs several times. I still do not think this is enough evidence to convince T-mobile of Phone Cloning. So I am thinking of switching either my number or my service provider. "
Have you seen all the spy movies. They are listening to your calls ;)
---- aut viam inveniam aut faciam
Get a new account -- new SIM's for both you and your partner and do it sooner rather than later, for your sake =)
You're a human being. But more importantly, you're a paying customer. Call them up, get the guy's name. Inform him that if he hangs up, you'll contact his supervisor. Then ask him what zip code these calls were made from, they should be able to figure that out. Verify that it's something reasonable.
If they won't believe you and you can convince them you're not making the calls, try calling the number and letting your phone ring. See if anyone picks up.
If that doesn't work, simply demand they change your number for you.
If they refuse to do that, be sure to inform them where you're taking your business.
Personally, I'd be pretty damned pissed if anyone ever hung up on me when I was simply inquiring as to why they were charging me money. In fact, I know right where I'd file that complaint.
If I had a credit card associated with the account, I'd call my credit card company and dispute the charge. You explain to the credit card company that they hung up on you twice. What the operator will do is put you on hold while they contact T-Mobile. The operator should introduce you to the T-Mobile rep and try to resolve the issue. If T-Mobile has a call from a credit card company, I'm certain they'll be a bit more understanding when they're looking at the possibility of having to chase down a stopped payment.
My work here is dung.
I showed up at a Verizon Wireless sales center, yelling and complaining (trust me, I can throw quite the tantrum,) until a manager finally got in touch with someone to fix the issue.
I got three months of free service for the trouble.. and since I've had perfect phone bills.
Never underestimate the power of being an ass when you're not treated fairly..
"Snatching defeat from the mouth of victory on a daily basis."
Why make it more complicated than it needs to be?
Just dispute those calls with T-Mobile and let them figure it out.
If your bill was over by $40 go back and tell them you didn't receive this call, you didn't receive that call, didn't make that call, etc.
They have the data to know when and where the calls were received based on the cell towers that the phone was received from.
Keep escalating the issue dude.
Call back and immediately ask to speak with a supervisor.
Get names.
Record the dates and time you called and who you spoke with.
Keep escalating up the chain of command if you have to.
If that doesn't work, file a formal complaint with the FCC and your State's Public Service Commission. That'll definitely get their attention.
Good luck!
1. Have you considered going into a T-Mobile store so they can't "hang up on you"?
2. I don't understand why they *would* "hang up on you", since you seem to have fairly reasonable records that you're receiving calls you didn't receive, and indeed, overlapping onto calls that you've made. Why would they think you're running a scam when you're asking questions about calls you didn't place on your bill?
3. Are you SURE your partner isn't really receiving these calls? I.e., have you been with him at known times when these alleged calls have come in?
Did you really need to "Ask Slashdot" about this? If T-Mobile's CSRs hung up on you, then you march down to the nearest store and let loose on the first salesperson you see. You *should* have gotten the names of those CSRs (I always make a point of writing down the person's name when I call any kind of support) to give to whoever it is that finally *does* take your complaint. Either they or their manager should be fired.
And, once you get this issue resolved, leave T-Mobile.
"More organs means more human." - Zim
I still do not think this is enough evidence to convince T-mobile of Phone Cloning. So I am thinking of switching either my number or my service provider.
You ask the question, "Has my cell number been cloned?" I ask the more pressing question... "Has your brain turned to mush?" DUH, if you're getting calls that you're not getting, then there's a problem.
You say "Both representatives hung up on me, thinking I was trying to con them or something." I say, you need to adjust your message to give them the facts -- customer support reps are only human. If you ramble on with your life story, or rant and rave, or interject useless details, then you might get hung up on. But T-Mobile gave me good service when I had them (I only dropped them because they didn't have good service in the middle of nowhere, where I live). If you call and say "Here are the calls that I neither made nor received. Please remove them from my bill and block me from ever recieving calls from the associated numbers." I can't imagine they'd refuse.
There's also the distinct possibility that the owner of the second line isn't being straight with you. I'm reminded of a poem I read on the bus:
By the time you swear you're his,
Shivering and sighing,
And he vows his passion is
Infinite, undying -
Lady, make a note of this:
One of you is lying.
-Dorothy Parker, Unfortunate Coincidence
Stressed? Me? Of course not. Stress is what a rubber band feels before it breaks, silly.
Wow... that was uncalled for. I had assumed by partner, he meant business partner. I will be taking on a business partner soon, and I would put him in a "family" plan if I had that type of service, because inter-calling would free in most cases. Even if it isn't his "business" partner, so what? Why do you have to use all the language? And of course, you assume the first person is a guy.
Kernel Krunch - Part of a Complete OS
I take it it is possible to recieve calls from yourself, on your own phone, whilst simultainiously making another outgoing call then?
Very Well done.
now please learn to read.
How about you're a dumber ass who doesn't know what an INCOMING call is?
Nowhere in the article does it say 2bepissedoff is a guy. Some women, especially in the tech world, hide their gender and use the word partner because they would rather have horny IT guys assume they are gay than a girl. Now ask yourself, why would "faggot" be the first thing to pop into your head? Why would such graphic images pop into your head? What is your subconscious trying to tell you? It's okay, stop hating yourself and admit what you are and what you like. You'll feel better in the end (pun intended.) People may make fun of you for it, but most of them are self hating fags, too.
physically go to one of the tmobile stores and talk to them. bring your phone bill and show them what you just explained to us. it's hard for a physical person to hang up on you (and comment that two support ppls had hung up on you!)
You're a self-righteous tosser. He's not talking about 'getting what he wants', he's talking about not being conned out of his money by Verizon. And what does "hurting people" have to do with anything, apart from making him sound worse in comparison to you?
Most GSM phones can handle two calls at once (a la call waiting/etc.), so overlapping times doesn't prove cloning.
The only theoretical way I am aware of to clone a GSM phone is to copy the SIM or have a SIM with the same subscriber number.
A simple fix would be to get a new SIM card. You can get your existing number transferred over to the new card. If its a card clone, then a new card will solve the problem.
Dunno why the customer service kept hanging up on you (was it really a hangup or a dropped call?), considering they supposedly have the best customer service in the business.
Terrorists can attack freedom, but only Congress can destroy it.
Jeez. I thought that was obvious from my post.
I just don't understand why he (and it is a he, trust me) insists on using "partner" instead of just calling a spade and spade.
Or your partner is cheating on you, did receive those calls, and is lying to you about it.
(Just saying. It happens all the time.)
We called up T-mobile twice and claim the possibility of phone cloning. Both representatives hung up on me, thinking I was trying to con them or something. Any advice to what this could be?
I suggest you call them and tell them that you did not make the calls in question (contest the calls). It's not your job to figure out what is going on, only to point out that a problem exists. Your mobile provider probably has some internal mechanism designed to investigate and resolve these matters (and the poor saps who usually answer the phone are probably not part of it, so just tell them your symptoms and they'll probably forward the information to the right people).
Uttering logically derived and empirically supported truths to the disciples of the orthodox establishment.
First off, your 17 minutes example is poor. The call could have ended at 3:44 and still be listed as 17 minutes, remember cell companies traditionally round you up to the nearest minute. If you had more then a possible 1 minute overlap example that would be different. Second, how well do you trust this "partner"? If they would presumably be on the hook for the overages if it was their fault, then they have motivation to lie same goes for if the calls are coming from someone they don't want you to know about...though I do not know what type of relationship you and this "partner" have.
Next, either go to a B&M location and bitch to someone in person, have bills in hand, or send a letter/e-mail to customer service. The letter and/or e-mail are ignorable, but at least someone should attempt to read it. IF you actually show up at a location you are pretty much non-ignorable. Be sure to express anger, but do not do anything too stupid. IF worse comes to worse, threaten legal action against the location, the employees and T-mobile (always casts wide nets, threatening individuals works because they don't want to lose their money...loyalty to their business is probably minimal.
So make sure to verify that neither you nor your partner received the calls...then go make a stink in person.
"Some days you just can't get rid of a bomb."
That, or you don't understand what the word "mostly" means.
--Phillip
Can you say BIRTH TAX
If you've got T-Mobile, the bill should break down WHICH phone is receiving the call (either yours or your partners). If it's happening on your partner's bill, I would suggest it's more likely that your partner is lying to you than the phone was cloned (just statistically speaking -- nothing against your partner).
Another possibility is that the entry on your bill is "bogus". The result of a computer glitch and you'll need T-Mobiles help to resolve the problem.
Then ask him what zip code these calls were made from, they should be able to figure that out. Verify that it's something reasonable.
Wife and I were having some problems keeping track of phone calls after our son was born (which is understandable...) We use Verizon, and their website when you log in will list all placed and received calls including numbers, locations, durations. We didn't even have to call a service rep.
The problem is that t-mobile does not acknowledge that cloning exists on their network. I used to work in T-mobile customer care. We got calls about this at least once a week. Most were just paranoia. The answer was always the same; "It is impossible to clone a SIM." Not much that you can do against that.
We can assume he is gay, or...
We can not bother because it's irrelevant to the question. Ask Slashdot isn't really a forum on sexual choices.
Don't look for zebras when all you have are horses, or, always look for the simplest answer.
It sounds like your boyfriend is cheating on you and is telling his new boyfriend to use number blocking (*67). Then when you ask him about it, he denies everything.
Instead of just "Record the dates..." you might also try the "record the call" and post it to the web thing that worked so well against AOL.
Assuming for the moment that everything you state is true, that neither you nor your partner are receiving these calls, to me it seems like a billing error and here's why. Have you ever had a friend call you to tell you that a call they made to your phone number was answered by a strange person? Do you receive many calls from people who are expecting somebody else (particularly the same somebody else) instead?
If neither of these things happen, than it's pretty unlikely that somebody is using your number for incoming calls.
-dave
/., where "Apple and Google provide Iran with nukes" will be refuted with "But Microsoft is a convicted monopolist"
I'm a big fan of T-Mobile, one of the only quality mobile networks in the US (even if they're restricted to the crappy 1900MHz band), so I'm disappointed you apparently are getting bad customer service from them.
I do recommend being careful about how you word it, when you talk about "phone cloning" and stuff then you're getting ahead of yourself. Let's address that first though:
Phone cloning is possible with GSM, but improbable, someone would be going to great lengths, buying equipment worth thousands of dollars, just to save a few dollars to make outgoing calls (the cloned cell is going to be unusable for incoming calls, after all.) While mobile phone cloning was a great business in the mid-nineties, that was when it was easier (plenty of analog phones, which could be cloned just be reflashing a second phone), and when mobile phones weren't exactly accessable to a sizable portion of the population.
Today, you can pretty much anonymously buy a prepaid mobile phone from any store, with a wide variety of minimum costs, generally of less than $10 a month from at least two major brands (T-Mobile and Cingular.) There aren't many people who'd want to clone phones, with the risks associated and the costs of doing the cloning to begin with, and the limitations on receiving calls, given the circumstances.
Your example isn't that convincing either as such circumstances would occur during call waiting or conference calling. I use both regularly, so my bill is full of these things.
The two most realistic circumstances are that there's a software error on T-Mobile's side, or that you're simply mistaken (possibly in terms of receiving the calls, or possibly in terms of how you're interpreting the bill.) Stop talking in terms of "My phone has been cloned!" and tell them that you and your partner believe these calls to be non-existant. Explain that they appear on your side of the bill, under your number, and you know you didn't receive them. Ask them to investigate.
You are not alone. This is not normal. None of this is normal.
Yah actually I noticed this issue too.
:)
A couple of years ago my roomates and I were renting from one of the roomates father. He decided to sell and we decided to make a venture into real estate and bought the place together. So for two years he was my partner? Um domestic partner? well um I guess so
We did live together, and own property together, by our employers definitions we were like a mutual checkbook away from being able to get on the same medical insurance package with domestic partner benefits.
-Steve
"I opened my eyes, and everything went dark again"
Oh dear God!
My phone bill would be hundreds of pounds a month - rather than the £15-£20 it normally is - if this happened in the UK. Over here, we get charged for making calls from our mobiles (cell phones), but the person calling my mobile is the one who gets charged for ringing me - I don't get charged for that unless I'm in a different country.
How come American consumers haven't risen up and complained about this? It seems a bit of a rip off to me.
--
silas
Does it matter? Is it a choice? So, you chose to be how you are?
Just curious.
So there.
Simple writing a formal letter of dispute under as defined by the Fair Credit Billing Act. Send said letter to the billing dispute address (usually on the back of your statement.) Indicate the calls you do not beleive you made, and the adjustment you beleive you deserve. If T-Mobile does not reply, IN WRITING, to your dispute they automatically lose the right to collect $50 or the disputed fee. Which ever is less. Make sure to send in Payment for the portion you do beleive you owe. I suggest spending the extra couple bucks to get delivery confirmation.
If they do not comply, file a formal complaint with the FTC and your state AG office.
hate to tell ya, but i used to work in a t-mobile call center, and it is not possible to hang up, they are not using phones to talk to you they are using a computer terminal that has T-mobile's proprietary software on it and well, there IS NOT a hang up button.
My provider gives free nights and weekends (which is when I primarily use the phone, seeing as I'm gainfully employed) and 500 free minutes during business hours. So it really isn't that bad for ~$35 a month. I've never gone over. My wife, who talks all the time, has only gone over once (and been billed for individual minutes). We've had Verizon for 4 years now...
I had a similar problem with AT&T Wireless a long time ago (ca. 1998), when they first introduced their "one-rate" service (no extra charges for long distance or roaming, a major innovation back then). For about three months, every single call I made or received appeared twice on my bill: once listed under the actual time I made or received it, and once listed precisely three hours later. That is, for every 17-minute call at 8:53, say, there'd be a corresponding 17-minute call at 11:53. I immediately recognized that this had to have something to do with the fact that I was using a phone with a New York number in California (three-hour time difference). The net result was close to a thousand dollars in overage charges -- while I was careful to keep all my usage under the 1500 minutes per month included in my plan, I was getting charged for more like 3000 minutes at a ridiculous overage rate of 25 cents a minute.
The first month the problem showed up I thought it would be a quick fix -- obviously no rational human being could think that I was studiously duplicating every single one of my hundreds of calls exactly three hours apart.
Silly me.
I went through eight months of hell trying to get an AT&T representative to acknowledge there was a problem. I must have made at least 100 calls, sent numerous faxes and letters, and spoken to at least 20 different "supervisors" -- they kept "disappearing," forcing me to start telling the story all over again each time I called.
To a man/woman, they all kept insisting that if the calls appeared on my bill, I had to have made them (since we all know computerized billing systems never have bugs). Until the very end I never got a single one of them to admit that there just MIGHT be a problem if every single one of my hundreds of calls appeared precisely twice, 3 hours apart, on each bill. No, I simply had to have made those calls, there was no other explanation.
Naturally were flatly unwilling to refund the overage charges which, as I mentioned, reached almost $1000 by the third bill. (I didn't cancel the service because I was dependent on it - it was my only phone line, there was no number portability back then, no other service offered "free" roaming/LD which I needed as a New Yorker stuck in California). They did agree to let me pay only the non-disputed charge until the dispute process was over, but soon started sending me dunning letters anyway.
The problem stopped happening after the third month, but I spent most of the rest of the year trying to get them to reverse the excess charges. It was hell, no other word for it. It wasn't the prospect of having to pay a thousand dollars that scared and angered me, it was the simple fact that a large and respected (!) company like AT&T obviously had a policy for its customer support people that went "no matter how obvious it is that the customer is right, you must insist that he is wrong." I don't see how any rational person could fail to recognize that what happened was a massive computer billing error, but as I mentioned before, I never got *anyone* to admit it. By the end, my conversations with them were so psychologically draining that I was starting to wonder if it really could be my mistake somehow.
The very end of the saga -- eight months later - was that I finally managed to talk to a manager who agreed there was a problem, told me that many others had experienced it, and canceled all the excess charges, just like that. So, basically, they'd known all along that there was a problem. and just kept stonewalling in the hopes that I'd break down and pay them.
That experience marked the end of my innocence about big, respectable business. In a very real sense, I "grew up" over those 8 months.
Am I the only one who thought of this?
It's better to be pissed off than pissed on!
ok, he's "Mostly" gay. :D
I used to work in the cell phone business, and here is an easy way to have them check for cloning. Speak with technical support, and have them check which towers you are pulling service from when these calls occur. If you make a call at 3:28pm connected to a tower in Los Angeles, and then 15 minutes later it says you are connected to a tower in San Diego; that is proof enough something weird is happening. Just highlight all these questionable calls on your bill, then ask to have the calls just before and jjust after checked to see which towers are in use.
The BBB is a national organization but their local operations have a bizarre amount of autonomy.
I got a settlement from a car dealer after just a couple of phone calls after contacting my own local BBB branch. Some of them do work like they're supposed to.
does your local news have an investigational reporter? mine does. he calls his show "i'm telling ken". ken is this big black guy who gets down to business. if someone is screwing you over, he'll go to the business and make things right. plus you could be on tv.
Does your phone keep a record of the last X days/weeks worth of calls? I've got my Treo set to keep it's phone log for the last three-four months, and it records everything... calls made, recieved, and missed. Perhaps presenting them with a copy of your log from each phone (Might be difficult, as I don't know of an easy way to export it) would help your case.
I had some problems where they sold me a phone with a $100 rebate that didn't exist in their system.
I got resolution by:
a) Writing a letter to the president of customer service (Sorry, I don't seem to have the name and address on this computer.)
b) Complaining to the BBB
They wound up crediting my account with the $100 rebate twice, once for each method of complaint. I didn't stop them, because I figured it was just compensation for the absurd amount of time it took to get it all sorted.
I got better efforts out of customer service by walking into a local T-Mobile store, where I'd purchased the phone, and asking the sales representatives to assist me with my issue, but those efforts got no results.
If this material about SIM card cloning is true, then how would it be possible to clone the card? Unless of course the person who did it is either a T-Mobile employee or somebody who has illegally obtained the card's transport key?
"You're a human being. But more importantly, you're a paying customer."
And my wife wonders why I expect another revolution...
Was your "partner's" name Adam?
Disputing the individual calls is the precisely correct thing to do. I'd start with that: call customer service and tell them you want to dispute some of the charges and list all the calls that you're disputing. Tell them that you did not receive those calls and neither did your partner and you want them removed from your bill. That's the correct method to start with. If the problem recurs, further complaint will be necessary, and then demand that they find out why this is happening and prevent it from happening again.
Calling the state's public service commission would be completely useless. States do not regulate cellular carriers. Tmobile would laugh and go about their business. At best you might be able to call the state attorney general and claim billing fraud if tmobile refuses to correct the problem, but even then the state may refuse to get involved on the basis of it being a national company.
You could also complain to the postal service police (the postal service has three police departments of its own) on the basis that they're billing you through the mail, which makes it mail fraud if the bill is fraudulent. But I'd make that a last resort.
Tmobile *does* have a special office for dealing with people who are thinking about leaving Tmobile. You could call their customer service number and tell them you're thinking about changing carriers because of their billing error and see if they transfer you to the special office. (They're pretty blunt about the fact that they're transferring you to a person whose job it is to try to mollify you.) That person might not be such an ass to you.
Also, you could go to your local Tmobile store. Find one that's corporate owned, not a franchise. (You can call customer service and ask, they can tell you which one(s) are corporate owned.) The store will have trained tmobile people in it, and they're a lot better about solving problems than the customer service number. I've had problems that the customer service number just flatly refused to fix (like, my voice mail just didn't work at all) and insisted wasn't broken, then I walked into the store and when they didn't get satisfaction out of customer service right away they used their special numbers to call technicians directly and make it happen. That's one example, but I've had several incidents, so I strongly recommend actually going in versus calling if that's feasible to you.
All of this politely assumes that your partner isn't receiving the calls. You could try calling tmobile and seeing if they can identify which phone they claim is receiving the calls. The example you give in which two calls supposedly overlap is meaningless unless they're claiming it was with the same phone. Even then, that can actually happen with only one line if you receive a call, then get bleeped by call waiting and talk to the new person for a minute before the first person disconnects. You really need to find an example on the bill where there are three calls going on for one line simultaneously, because I think unless you've asked for it Tmobile doesn't enable conference calling, or your phone interface may not make it possible. Again, you could ask about that.
It's very annoying, but it seems like the only way to get problems resolved anymore is to act like a jerk.
I've had a couple of experiences where being reasonable and polite got me nowhere with customer service, but when I got frustrated at the end of the conversation (after being told several times "there's nothing we can do") and basically gave them and their manager hell over the problem, it got resolved ("OK sir, we'll send out a replacement right away").
The most frustrating thing about this (to me) is that I don't want to have to be an ass to get a problem fixed. In fact, I go out of my way to do business with companies that fix the problem the first time when I come and politely ask for assistance. I don't recall this being the case in my younger years, but that may be more a result of my memory than an actual decline in customer service.
Interested in a Flash-based MAME front end? Visit mame.danzbb.com
The fact that this guy/gal is saying the T-Mobile reps hung up is what makes me skeptical of this whole story.
I know you almost never hear a statement like this about any company -- which is why I'm going to come out and say it -- but I've actually been nothing but satisfied with the customer service at T-Mobile. I've had to call numerous times, for various reasons, and the rep on the phone has invariably been extremely courteous.
I think I can count one occasion where the person I spoke to didn't really seem to understand what was going on and I ended the call without getting much satisfaction. I called back later with the same problem, spoke to someone else, and got the problem resolved. All the other times I was escalated to the level of support that could help me with my problem with no fuss, quickly and politely. I've even been handed off for second-level support to RIM for my Blackberry when it was necessary; nobody even gave me the slightest hard time. And they always, always thank me for my business -- sometimes the dumb little things count.
Another time I noticed an instant messaging charge on my bill that seemed out of place (I get unlimited SMS). Instead of getting mad, I just wrote up a quick e-mail on their Web site stating plainly that I thought the charge was erroneous and I'd like it reversed (please). A few days later I got an e-mail back saying, sure enough, they decided it was a mistaken charge, were reversing it, and were giving me 20 free anytime minutes also. No problem.
So I'm extremely skeptical about this whole story. T-Mobile hasn't been winning J.D. Power customer support awards for nothing. For two different reps to actually hang up on somebody tells me that either A.) somebody called up, screaming and yelling irrationally and refusing to take any kind of due process to address the issue; or B.) somebody's making up a story for some reason.
(Of course, it could be possible that the submitter is talking about T-Mobile in Europe, which I can't speak to.)
Breakfast served all day!
just kidding .. no really he is .. i'm just messing with you .. but seriously yeah.
My main reaction to this is that they have NO--zero, zilch, zip--excuse for hanging up on you ONCE, much less twice. That is simply outrageous, and you shouldn't have to tolerate it. If this continues to go on, tell them you'll take them to small claims court--if they're charging you for calls you never made, that's called "fraud." If their network has been pwned, that's their problem not yours. You have no obligation to pay for it.
Gifts for Geeks - Stuff that really matters!
I've had my fair share of nasty complaints about tmobile as well, but who's better? I too got frustrated with them and investigated the possibility of changing carriers, but I found equally stupid and obnoxious errors on the part of each and every carrier reported on the net. The truth is every cell carrier is a huge corporation that doesn't care much about the individual customer, and so as long as things are going well or having problems within their usual range they cope well, but when things get confusing to them it all sorta breaks down. I decided it would be better for me to stick with tmobile and make them resolve the problem than to try to switch to another carrier and deal with their unpredictable problems: at least with tmobile I can make them look at my account and see I've been a customer for 7 years and that makes them a little bit more interested in helping me.
Maybe they're just mostly gay.
-h-
We called up T-mobile twice and claim the possibility of phone cloning. Both representatives hung up on me, thinking I was trying to con them or something.
The problem is that you're trying to supply a conclusive diagnosis to the T-mobile rep when you actually ahve no freakin' idea why those charges are appearing. Quit trying to offer them an explanation up front. That sounds like a con. Just give them the symptoms-- i.e. calls/charges on the bill that aren't yours-- and let them figure out what's happening.
If a job's not worth doing, it's not worth doing right.
Or your partner is cheating on you, did receive those calls, and is lying to you about it.
Did you read the article? He's got two lines, and from the sounds of it, mystery calls are showing up on both lines.
I have been receiving incoming calls from a 'NBR unavailable', since February, with talk time ranging from 1 minute to an hour. The strangest thing is, I have never received these calls (my phone doesn't ring and I haven't talked to the caller). I only started noticing them when my phone bill was charged over $40 more than my regular bill. Of course, I have a family plan (2 people only, 2 lines)
Please help metamoderate.
I work for one of the top 5 American cell phone providers specifically in the department that maintains the billing system. This is the suite of systems that go from switch records to taxed and formatted bills to be sent off to the printing houses (as well as roamer records to be shipped off to other providers, records for partners, etc.)
Let me tell you something you may not realize -- all of these systems have bugs. Some of them are horrible bugs. Bugs like ringtones getting double-taxed or calls getting billed when you ring a number but don't get an answer with absolutely no way to tell the difference between a legit call and a call that didn't answer.
Some of these bugs are due to flaws within the billing system. Some are bugs in the switch data (the absolute worst kind because there's no good way to filter the data when good and bad records are all marked up the same). Some are tables screw ups that lead to entire bills getting mangled. Some of these bugs get caught by the bill checking department and others may go for months without being noticed until a customer complains.
"Number unavailable" calls are most likely from records that were sent to the billing system with no other party number populated (or populated with some default "we don't know what this is" value). Our system simply replaces the other number with your own number and keeps going. Other providers probably cover for it in some other way as well.
What you have may in fact be legit phone calls that had mangled or incomplete switch records or records from the inter-carrier clearinghouse. Alternately, you may have junk data that you don't deserve to be billed for. It's all up how your company handles such complaints on what to do with about it. I know that my company frequently requests us to go find how many customers were affected and by how much so that we can either strip records from the bills and rerun them or go back and credit the customers proactively. We always try to err on the side of underbilling rather than overbilling customers because it's better to lose some money up front and give customers a pleasant surprise rather than after a nasty lawsuit with all the bad publicity.
However, if T-Mobile hangs up on you, that just isn't right. Call them up and simply say that you'd like to dispute the charges and have their billing team investigate where the records came from. That'll probably lead to a bug report being filed somewhere in their bureaucracy and a fix for you and others having the same problem. If they give you crap, then switch providers. It's not like there aren't multiple GSM service providers in the US now.
If it's for-profit but free, you're not the customer -- you're the product (e.g., the Slashdot Beta's "audience").
It is easy, write a letter explaining the situation, highlight the disputed charges and write the check short that much.
The phrase "more better" is acceptable English. suck it grammar Nazis
We're here, were queer, we have cell phones, get used to it.
(In reply to down-modded thread:) You're right, of course—grandparent post could well have been meant sincerely. Even if it were supposed to be a troll, the alternate interpretation is still a good point in the context of this discussion. I'm sorry that you got modded down for your insight.
And now, a PSA from David Lynch.
>> 2/22 at 3:28 pm "NBR unavailable" 17mins usage.
... They bill you for 17 minutes .. They certainly don't give you 27 free seconds, so it "started" at 3:44
>> 2/22 at 3:44 pm "-(# I made)---" 3mins usage.
Call #1 could end at 3:44:31
Call #2 could start at 3:44:33
What you did on your call was equivalent to:
"My Video Card is broken" to tech support.
Don't tell them the problem. Tell them the symptoms.
You: "My Monitor is blank"
Them: Is your monitor plugged in?
You: "Oh, wow.. it is. Thanks! I was worried my video card died."
American cell phone plans come with a largeish (600 - 1500) number of prepaid minutes attached to the plan... so, I pay $40 a month, but the first 1000 minutes of calling (in either direction) don't cost me anything more. Also, there are cheap add-ons to allow, or some plans even include, features such as free calls after 7:30pm or free calls on weekends or free calls to family members. (I can get both free nights and free weekends for another $10 a month, for example.)
So, put these things together and for $50 a month (just slightly more than the cost you mention for your monthly bill) you can end up paying a bill that doesn't actually charge you for any calls except calls to non-family members made before 7pm on weekdays that exceed the first 1000 minutes. For most people, that far exceeds actual usage, so they don't care if incoming calls are being included because they almost never end up paying a per-minute rate anyway.
It's virtually impossible to close a GSM phone - and surely if somebody had, they'd have been making obscenely expensive outgoing calls on it. Two possibilities:
T-Mobile have cocked up - they can easily check the calls and get more information about them to confirm if this is the case.
Your partner is lying/mistaken about receiving calls. If I had a suspicious mind, I'd just 'borrow' his phone and check the call log on the handset - see if one of the mysterious calls appears there.
The total telecom costs are more competitive and come out less expensive in a system like ours (North America - mobile party pays for incoming and terminating calls; no landline to mobile termination fees).
In the UK (and most other countries), the landline-to-mobile rate is fixed at a high price. The mobile companies have no strong incentive to lower their termination fees, because they're not charging "their" customers - it's the other schmucks (landline customers) who get the shaft (customers they want to steal away from landline!). Of course there could be some limited competition on the landline side to get the "lowest" mobile termination fees, but in the end the landline carriers still have to negotiate that with the mobile provider. How much would 1000 minutes cost from landline to mobile in the UK? £36.10 - £215.40, depending on the carrier and time-of-day?
In the North American system, the entire minute bucket of incoming and outgoing minutes is negotiated between the mobile provider and their direct customer. Therefore, there is significant competition between carriers to provide the lowest total price. In other words, when you select a carrier here, you are negotiating the price on both sides. Over there, you are only negotiating the outgoing side of the equation (for the most part). How much would 1000 minutes (either direction) cost in the US? $40 (or free on nights/weekends)?
In the future, it seems like unlimited wireless is a distinct possibility (it already exists in my market!). In North America, that means that there will be no mobile-related charges whatsoever for incoming or outgoing. Do you think that foreign carriers will let go of mobile termination fees even if/when outgoing calls become free (unlimited)? In my case, I could pay $70/month and nobody would pay any per-minute fees to or from my phone!
I was billed for 350 text messages in the span of 2 minutes. I called and told her I didn't do that and wanted the $35 refunded. She said "it's in the system." I pointed out that it was physically impossible for anyone to send that many text messages in 2 minutes and that I had used text messaging 0 times in the year i'd been with Cingular. Her response? "Computers don't make mistakes."
Maybe I was a little harsh: "You're an idiot. I'm cancelling my account not because of Cingular's service or this charge, but because you ma'am, are an idiot." The cancellation rep tried to convince me to stay and generously offered to cut the charges in half... "I shouldn't have to negotiate how much I pay you for your mistake. How about you refund the full amount and then pay me $100 in consulting fees for the hour I've spent identifying bugs in your system?" Then came the offer of a full refund, and I still cancelled.
If someone HAS cloned your SIM, and both phones are attached at the same time, the network would register a fault, as a SINGLE sim number is assiciated at two different locations. It woudl create a fault in the system which would prevent both yours and the clone SIM from working. This is actually one of the main reasons why Cellphones are not usable on Planes (even if it is prooven to be safe to the electronics). The phone woudl try to log onto multiple cells at the same time, causing a lot of strain on the network, or even malfunction.
What? What about when you are on the ground and happen to be standing in between 3 different towers, an equal distance from each? Wouldn't that be the same kind of situation you are talking about in an air plane? YOu may know a LOT about cell phones, but this thing about Cellphones and Planes sounds wrong to me.
"They that give up essential liberty to obtain a little temporary safety deserve neither liberty nor safety"-B.Franklin
Do you have NOTHING better to do than to waste /.'s bandwidth? Seriously, even if anyone in their right mind agreed with you, do you really think that anyone gives a shit about your opinions? Do you think anyone cares about you think?
We don't.
And for the record, I'm a lesbian. And I laughed last time I got a derogatory comment. It was funny!
"partner", hmmm?
Married people are bad enough about staying faithful.
The unmarried fare far worse, and pairs of men even
worse than that.
Have you thought that maybe there is a possibility the poster was a woman?
Jumpstart the tartan drive.
From the responses I have seen posted, I would like to clear up a few facts ... ... if you (A) have a conversation with (B) and (C) calls, you tell (B) you need to talk to (C) and switch the call over. Problem arises when (B) doesn't bother to hang up and the call overlaps... ... if the cell phone identifies as an unknown caller but matches the number to a contact in your phone book, the contact's name will show up...
1. Calls can overlap -- call waiting, call conferencing
2. T-mobile will not block a number - their system is not set up that way.
3. Just because the caller ID shows up as 'Number unavailable' doesn't mean you don't know who it is
4. If a rep really did hang up on you and you remember the dates/times, you can file a complaint with another rep who has the ability to look at the notes from your previous calls and find out who you spoke to. The reps don't hang up on customers because they feel like it, there is normally a 3 strikes warning if you start using bad language or a dead air script if they cannot hear you. If they hang up on you, it is immediately flagged so its not in the rep's best interest to ever disconnect without following the proper chain.
5. If you are really worried about cloning, go to the t-mobile website http://www.t-mobile.com/Contact.aspx and write a letter or e-mail or send us a fax with a detailed description of what you think has happened.
I had a problem with Nextel Customer Service. A $120 charge showed up on my bill with no explination. Customer support couldn't/wouldn't explain the charge. After about 5 useless calls to customer service I filed a complaint with the FCC. A VP from Nextel called me back withing 2 days removed the charge and gave me a $100 credit. Worked real nice :)
Also hilarious to me. When I read the article I didn't even notice it said partner as opposed to some REAL family members, like a wife.
For the most part the BBB is a reporting service. So they really dont "do" anything, other then report the complaints to people that ask.
---- Booth was a patriot ----
Do you have an actual T-Mobile store in your area? And I don't mean the kiosks in the mall.
If you do, go into the store and tell them. It's not like they can turn you away. If they give you shit, demand the manager.
If you don't have a store in your area, call T-Mobile and immediately ask to speak to a supervisor.
If you really think its cloned, suck it up and make them give you a new number.
Cruising the internet on my TI-99/4A @ a whopping 300 baud!
There is no Project Mayhem!
There exists no way of exchanging information without making judgments. --Bene Gesserit Axiom
Married people are bad enough about staying faithful.
The unmarried fare far worse, and pairs of men even
worse than that.
I'm sure r00t has enough direct empirical research
to back these claims up. He Sure sounds bitter enough.
Stop being so bitter, r00t, I'm sure your butt
buddy still loves you!
That is, because American society does not yet fully appreciate the validity of gay relationships, the word "husband" (indicative of a committed legal bond sanctioned by the state) can't be used, so he has to say "partner."
Yet, if he had said "wife," also indicative of a commited legal bond sanctioned by the state, would anyone have questioned whether his wife had really received these calls, when the poster didn't indicate as such? Is somehow a gay relationship less "committed" or less "trustworthy" than a straight relationship? I think not.
Discrimination shows up in the oddest ways, even among the educated and tolerant (yeah, I know this is Slashdot, yada, yada,...). It's important to recognize the possibility of it for what it is, so that we can all grow.
are you the hot kind of lesbian? you know, the kind that still looks like a girl? or the kind that lets the facial hair grow in and wears flannel?
Have you thought that maybe there is a possibility the poster was a woman?
Okay, now you're getting into a whole make-believe world here.
Where does the school board find them and why do they keep sending them to ME?
I often use the word partner to refer to my fiancee who is a woman and I am a guy. She is my partener in every sense of the word so why is it in appropriate to use the term. i'm not saying I always asay partner I just use it as uch as girlfriend fiancee or wife they are all interchangeable for me as we have already made the committment we don't need the states invovlvement. Anyways the use of the word partner is not and has never been strictly for the gay community. Hell I've used partner refering to my best friend from high school and we are both straight. As far as the cell problem I would call back t-mobile and go off on people till they remove the charges. Believe me if you yell at them long enough they will do it.
WTF?
They have jedi mind powers to convince you that your reality is not real. Only the telco reality exists.
Where is the rebel base?
does your phone bill include what number these calls were from? if so, try to call that person back. If he starts talking to you about bombs and such before realizing it is not the person on the Caller ID, then call CTU (the one with Jack Bauer). They will set up a trace on the call and then start shooting his kneecaps if he doesn't tell you what they are planning....
:)
Or, as was suggested earlier, call up and before saying anything ask for the person's name and boss's number. That way if he does hang up, you are one step further up the chain of command. You could even keep doing the same thing until you get the CEO on the line.
Help Me! I'm trapped in the tubes! Oh noes! Here comes a internet!
*snicker*
"They're in it with the aliens! They're building landing strips for gay martians!"
*snicker*
Anyone get the reference?
I had a similar problem involving T-Mobile "T-Zones". While idle, my phone
was apparently contacting T-Zones. In fact, once in a while I'd 'catch' it
making an (autonomous) one minute T-Zones connection (because the phone
would light up).
Since I wasn't a T-Zones subscriber, T-Mobile billed me for each and every
connection, even though the connections were happening 'automatically'.
For the first few months I didn't notice it because I was on the road and
running up massive phone bills anyway, but by the time I realized what was
going on, I was $5,000 in the hole. It took months of phone calls to customer
service for them to even acknowlege that there was a problem. I even made a
short video of my phone 'turning itself on and connecting to T-Zones'.
I will say, that T-Mobile ended up being great, and clearing my bill of
all the charges, but only after 50 or so calls to CS.
Total nightmare.
------ The best brain training is now totally free : )
T-mobile has the best customer service?! Is that why it took me over 3 months to get my parents number ported over, and it would have taken longer if I hadn't taken over and got in their face. They had the worst customer service towards me, several hangups and hundreds of transfers later, I finally got the numbers ported over, then the bill was never right, so I finally had them switch over to Cingular to shich I have had very little problems.
has anyone put forth the obvious here?
;)
your 'partner' is cheating on you and lying about using the minutes
Bad customer service.
Slashdot: Failed Car Analogies. Amateur Lawyering. Anecdote Battles.
It sounds like you need to call the FCC or the SEC (Securities and Exchange Commission). I know from working at MCI for several years that the phone company is supposed to handle your claims of fraud very seriously, and if they aren't you need to talk with the government about it.
FCC Info (try them first):
http://www.fcc.gov/contacts.html
1-888-225-5322
SEC Info:
http://www.sec.gov/contact.shtml
1-800-SEC-0330
Good Luck!
When I signed up for T-mobile last December (I wanted the single phone that works in US and Europe) I started to receive some junk messages from mobilebabes.com (it happened first right in the store). I did not really use the phone and for the whole month it was laying turned off. To my surprise I received a bill with $20 charges for "Premium Services" and was told these charges were legitimate and come from some "3-rd party", not T-Mobile. After several hours of waiting on the phone and they told me that it was previous owner of the number who signed up fro the service and I have to contact the service provider and unsubscribe. I was also told that they can not remove the MMS service (I don't need it - just voice, text messages and Internet) so the only what they can do is change my number. It costs $15, but they will not charge me.
...
After that we exchanged many dozens of emails - but from their side it was usually a robot. And the name (like "Christina" below were probably randomly generated - it was never the same when I replied. Inside part of the emails was also generated from the standard snippets (like "today I spent more than an hour studying your account...") - they never answered the questions I asked, substituting my questions with some standard ones
Dear Andrey Filippov,
Thank you for taking the time to contact T-Mobile. My name is Christina and I will be assisting you today...
And it took me three months until they compensated me their porno-charges. The text messaging service (I'm paying for) does not work, but I'm just completely tired communicating with those robots to fix it. I should write some script to do that for me - then there will be equals.
Nobody was able to answer - if the only way to stop MMS messages coming to my phone is to change it's number - does it mean that anybody who knows my number can send me pay-per-message junk?
Last year my wife's phone was stolen. We reported it immediately (that same day) to Sprint, and had the phone number shut off so no calls could be made to or from the phone.
:(
About a month later, we finally found a phone on Ebay, and bought it and had the number turned back on and all was well. Later that night, we got a little text message from a random number with a silly joke on it. Thinking it might have been one of her friends just sending random jokes, we just ignored it. The jokes continued about one a day, sometimes two a day for the next two weeks.
When I got the bill, I was astounded that it was almost $50 more than normal. I immediately called Sprint and asked what these "Premium Text Message" charges were for. They told me "Oh thats normal text messaging fees". I called BS. Normal text message fees are 10 cents per, not 99 cents per message.
After talking about about 5 people that night, and wasting an hour of my time, I found out the text messages from one of those Joke-a-Day services, which had been subscribed to on my wife's phone. Looking at the date of the text messages and charges, it was obvious that they started right in the middle of when we didn't have the phone. The phone was stolen and "shut Off" At the end of August, and reactivated at the beginning of October. The text messages started showing up on the bill in September.
I politely told the person to credit off the fraudulent charges, and stop the messages coming to my phone. The CSR told me that they can't do that. They said that they're not the one charging me, its the Joke-a-day service. I told them that I don't buy that, since when I make my check out, it says "Sprint", not "Sprint/JokeCrap". I told them to do the leg work, since it was their issue, not mine.
After two more calls and about 4 hours wasted talking to 10 people, I was told to send the word "STOP" to their joke service, and that would stop the text messages. I was also told I'd finally get a credit for the previous month, and that if any more text messages showed up, I'd be responsible for them. I said "Well, if your directions work, then fine, thats ok with me"
Needless to say, I got more messages the next day than I had previously. I called back to Sprint and told them the issue. I asked what the hell do I need to do. They said they would then block all text messages at the tower, so my wife wouldn't be able to get any more. I said ok, thats fine.
The next day, no text messages! I was thrilled and thought I had seen the end of this. Not so. I followed up the next and checked if there were any fees on the account from the previous week. Sure enough they were there. Sprint had managed to block the Messages from getting to her phone, but we were still getting billed for them being sent!
It came down to having to change her phone number in order to get the messages to stop. (In that process they accidentally changed mine, and I nearly lost my phone number).
The billing part gets better, too. After the first credit I got, they told me no more credits. I explained to them that since they didn't know how to operate their own system, and it caused me to get billed incorrectly, I'd be damned if I'm paying for it. AFter another 3 calls and getting myself escalated up to a region support manager, I finally said, "If you don't resolve this on this call, I'm going to the FCC and going to explain the whole thing out". That got her attention, and she credited off the remaining charges.
I would have dropped them faster, but it would have cost me $150 per phone to drop out of the contract
The cloning is a red herring. Your bill is wrong. Tell them, ask them to fix it. You don't know if it's cloning, and you don't care. By throwing out irrelevant theories, you are just distracting from the real issue.
I wonder what that could mean... (not that there's anything really wrong with it).
Similar to the upcoming US election results
"...take a look at the soil around any large city with a big underground homosexual population - Des Moines, Iowa, perfect example. Look at the soil around Des Moines, Stuart. You can't build on it. You can't grow anything on it. The gov't says that it's due to poor farming, but I know it's the queers..."
....or something like that.
Your bigotry is funny to me. I hope they institute new taxes such as useless matter taxes. Preferrably taxed by the pound.
The evaluation of an action as 'practical' . . . depends on what it is that one wishes to practice.
"We don't care. We don't have to. We're the phone company."
The example you give might be expanable. Your 17 minute call could have started at 3:28:01 and lasted until 3:44:35. Maybe if it's over 16.5 minutes, they bill it as 17 minutes. Having completed the call, you immediately call someone else. It takes you ten seconds to dial and that call begins at 3:44:45. I would expect them to log that call as being at 3:44. Is it also possible that you made one call and your partner made the other one? Because you checked with him to see if the calls were his, I'm assuming you can't tell from the bill whose call is whose.
Have you thought that maybe there is a possibility the poster was a woman?
A woman named Cliff?
Do not make a family...Should be a fag plan and not a family plan.
After having my landline (provided by AT&T) disconnected in 2004, I had ignored the bill for some time (I had other, more important things to spend money on, like food) and moved away. A year later, I receive a bill in the mail (even though I never told them my new address) with a charge on it for a 411 call from a payphone looking for me. It wasn't much added onto the bill, but left it alone to be handled at a later date.
About a month ago, I sent a payment in for the full amount owed. Waited a few days and contacted AT&T. Regardless of the fact that I was transferred around for 3 hours at which point I was informed that "Oh, you're account was with AT&T BEFORE the merger... You'll need to call this number" I called that number and was informed "The credit department just closed 10 minutes ago." Called them again the next day and was told "We have received your payment and the account has been paid in full with no amount owed"
Then, about a week ago, I receive a letter from a collection agency, looking to collect the already paid balance. I called the collection agency to find out what was going on here, and they said that "AT&T should not have accepted the payment" and "We have sent you numerous letters regarding this.", but they have no proof of any mailings.
I live in Croatia - a country where T-Com is one of the most irritating monopolies.
The behaviour you describe is, I'm afraid, nothing unusual for them.
I moved away from their DSL service after I supposedly downloaded some 4 GB of data in one day, which was a bit more than double the free space on my hard drive at the time. Never even touched their mobile service.
Actually, I hate them more then I hate Microsoft.
</rant>
Ignore this signature. By order.
or C.) The criminal mastermind using his phone is also monitoring his calls and disconnected him when he started talking to the T-mobile rep about what was happening.
- The system is unable to properly record Carol's call. It shows up as "unknown" in Alice's phone's call log and may not show as an identified number on her bill.
- Alice will be double-billed for the time that she's talking with Carol, because Bob is still sitting there with his call "on hold" in the system. This should - should - stop if Bob hangs up.
Check if this is a possibility. (The CSR should have checked too, but I'm not sure if front-line CSRs would know this.)It may be possible that a second number got tied to your *account* somehow. My first suggestion was going to be look for overlaps. Now that you have found one, call customer service and (all sweetness and light) ask how such a thing could possibly happen? The best would be to pick a couple of fairly long overlaps: more than a few minutes becomes very hard to explain away (unless you make conference calls but in that case, they cannot both be inbound AFAIK). If the unknown calls are following a pattern, you could try ensuring that your phone is actually OFF during some of those times. If you can get a call (that's not just VM) when your phone is off, call the police as well. CS is going to hop to it a lot faster if you have a police incident#.
Distinguish inbound vs outbound calls. A short inbound call could be a voice mail call.
Finally, take one of your bills in and actually get someone to sit down and explain the bill to you (don't tell them what the bill means...ask leading questions..."so what does it mean when two calls overlap like this? I get charged for that? how long can a voice mail message be?"). Forcing them to go through the analytical process will probably lead them to the same "that's odd" moment that you had.
The most important part of his suggestion is that you list the symptoms of the problem and not try to convince them you know the cause. These billings systems are monstrously complex, and all sorts of things can go wrong. When you come with a proposed solution, not only are you mostly likely tediously wrong, but you sound like someone's who has come up with an angle to get yourself out of something you did instead of a genuinely puzzled customer who wants to know why this is happening to them.
Calling up support determined that you have a particular problem is just as arrogant and futile for remedying your problem as doing the same with a doctor. You don't know as much as you think you know from reading junk online, and while you may be smart, you don't have the domain knowledge to get what's going on.
(Also, SIM cloning is not your problem. You wouldn't be getting only calls meant for you while the "bad guy" only got calls meant for him. It doesn't work that way. It's also monstrously difficult to pull off at all with modern phones and royally screws with the switches if they are both used at the same time.)
(Furthermore, as others have pointed out, overlaps of a single minute aren't uncommon thanks to the rounding up of time to next minute that most billing systems do.)
Lastly, though, skip the last bit about complaining to regulators. They'll do nothing. The company will do nothing. All you'll get is elevated blood pressure. The correct procedure is to dispute individual records. Once the company has decided these are good or bad, that's pretty much your last court of appeal unless you want to spend a lot more money than $40.
If it's for-profit but free, you're not the customer -- you're the product (e.g., the Slashdot Beta's "audience").
We called up T-mobile twice and claim the possibility of phone cloning.
Not that I think Slashdot should become the point where people ask for advice on consumer complaints, but as long as you're asking, why don't you claim the far more likely possibility which is that T-Mobile simply screwed up on the billing. This kind of stuff happens a lot more than cloning. Or even better, don't claim the possibility of anything. Let them figure it out. Simply contest the calls. Talk to a supervisor. Get peoples names. If they're hanging up on you, there's a serious problem going on and you might need to write letters. But this is hardly News for Nerds. And it's only "Stuff that Matters" to you.
The overlap you are talking about can be justified if they say that the two calls were from the two lines you have. You can have overlapping calls if you have more than one line.
I have a partner as well. We are of opposite sex, so your jealous, vindictive, increasingly irrelevant $(GOD) should not be offended (perish the thought).
People often mistake us for being married (must be something to do with how we interact). We are, however, not married. We can't go around calling each other husband and wife, because that would be misleading, since we're not married. Hence, we refer to each other as, "partners."
In other words, the term "partner" is not exlcusively used to refer to same-sex relationships. In fact, from the context of the article, "partner" could even refer to a business relationship, rather than a personal one.
Like most religious/Republican extremists, you are likely incapable of apology, regardless of how strongly it is merited. Absent such, self-immolation will do nicely. *plonk*
Schwab
Editor, A1-AAA AmeriCaptions
They're just mad because unlike 99% of this site his partner isn't a penguin..
That's hilarious.. I didn't catch the irony in that the first time around
But it's your significant other calling her other boyfriend and lying to you about it. She's good.
You might consider contact the FBI or HS. It is possible that you have been cloned, and more than likely not just to make calls to a DefCon f0n3 bridge. NBR Unavalable is usually a result of an international number.
--AD
Man, you are funny. I hope some other mods can see it that way.
"I'd like to speak with your fraud department"
The call-center operators are trained to immediately pass those calls on.
My phone got cloned in the D.C. area several years ago -- over $500 of calls made to Canada by several someones. Once I got through to the fraud department at Sprint, they were able to get things straightened out and my account creditted. It helped that my phone was on & registered in North Carolina with their network at the same time the calls were being made from distant states.
Chip H.
is it possible for people to suppress caller ID for outgoing calls? and if so, why?
by comparison, people who send email are forced to reveal their address, or are forced to forge them.
is the partner getting these calls on their phone at times when you are not with them?
Just a thought, but sometimes the simplest explanations are the correct ones.
It is very hard to clone a SIM enabled phone (which is what T-mobile uses)
In fact, I know right where I'd file (BBB) that complaint.
I have two questions for you:
1. Have you ever filed a BBB complaint?
2. Before every purchase, do you look up the company's record at the BBB?
The answer to both of these questions for almost everyone is "no".
If you want to file a BBB complaint, expect to spend about 20 hours of your own time making sure that it gets put on their record. I've done it, and believe me - the onus is on you. Expect to have to make or take about 15 phone calls, send 2 or 3 FAXes and send 2 or 3 letters. Oh, and when the company replies that you're full of crap, you have 5 days to refute what they say - in writing. There's typically three ping-pong statements from both parties before anything gets put on the company's record. It takes months and it is not easy at all. One slip up, and the complaint is discarded and at best you start over from scratch.
I'm a big tall mofo.
T-Mobile and most other comapnies in the US, and in the US only, charge minue-by-minute rates. meaning... in that reference that you had... you might have started the call at 3:28:01, "01" being the seconds. When you eneded your call at 3:44:02, you have skipped into your 17th minute. and your next consecutive call starting at 3:44:03 onwards up until 3:45:00 will say you started at 3:44. Thus the overlap.
To most T-mobile users, and many other cell users, when you drop a call, you quickly stumble to continue your call call. One you start the dialing... not once you connect like most imagine... once you press the dial button on your cell is when the mionutes start counting.
This is the most possible and most valid solution. Phone cloning is possible, but given the strict procedure dictated by the towers, and the possibility of registering the phone on a remote tower owned by Cingluar for example, one of the clones will be shut off. Besides... testing by people who have made clones shows that both clones ring for an incomming call. multiple outgoing calls, from the same number are allowed though. But once detected by the terminals, the entire account is usually suspended.
You shouldn't blame a company for lack of knowldge on you side.
Ok, so the phone company acts as if they don't know what the numbers are? I call bullshit. Do you think the list that they turn over to the NSA/CIA/FBI has 'unknown caller' written all over it? Fuck no it doesnt. It probably gives the phone number, account holders name and address of every call, if not far more.
I really really hate it when companies play stupid. I lost a cell phone a while ago and went to the store. I wanted them to stop service on that line while I got another phone, and asked them if any calls had been made from the phone in the hours since I lost it. They said that they couldn't get those records. Fuck that. Say an FBI agent went into the store and needed the same information due to "Terrorisim". The information would be instant. I also asked if there was any way to guess what city the phone was in and if it was moving. They flatly responded no. (I had lost my phone in some cab I had taken that day, and if i knew what city it was in i could have called that cab company). I know that this is possible since they have been tracking down "crimials and terrorists" by using triangulation on their cell phones.
I was a paying customer standing there and being lied to. I had another problem on a land line. I was getting calls from a fax line about 10 times per night from an 'unknown' number. I called the phone company several times. They said that since it was unknown number they couldn't do anything about it. I asked if they could block that number from calling me. Nope, since it was unknown. Now what if I had called the police/fbi and said that they last number that called my fax had sent terrorist threats, or maybe that it was a person talking about their jihad. The number could have been found out within minutes.
So on your company, I also call bullshit. I am sure your records that they are turning over to big brother are accurate, and the ones they had you are probably not. Now let me go pack my things. I am sure that for thinking too much i'll be picked up any time now by the thought police.
Tibbon
tibbon.com
I want to see an instance with a 2 or more minute overlap, the instance above could prove nothing but maybe funky billing practices.
Wanna fight ? Bend over, stick your head up your ass, and fight for air.
> A woman named Cliff?
Funny, but Cliff posted the message on the site, he wasn't the author. "2bepissedoff" is the person who wrote it.
That would be the Dream Police (TM Cheap Trick) are looking for you. :)
...
Your helpful scared coward aiming to please again, and again, and
Her response? "Computers don't make mistakes."
"Yeah, that's why there's a multi-billion dollar a year industry to repair them."
The same could be said for your post. We don't care what you think either, so why did you even post?
Either way, unless someone got a hold of your SIM card and copied it, I doubt you have been cloned. And generally in cases like that, the usage is much higher or there is more substance other than some calls to and from an unavailable number. I'm not saying the truth isn't stated here, but I find it very hard to believe two times you have been hung up on unless you have been VERY abusive. I think the best thing to do here is have someone from T-Mobile investigate the issue for you. Call in again and tell them in a nice, concise way that you are seeing calls you don't believe you have made and would like to see them investigate it. I wouldn't mention cloning as I highly doubt this is the reason you are seeing this.
You should file a complaint about the BBB with the BBB.
I had exactly the same thing happen - a huge bill one month and a lot of calls that I hadn't made, including 5 (yes, five) 911 calls that I definitely didn't make.
At the time I put it down to T-Mobile incompetence rather than anything sinister. Maybe I should be a little more suspicious - I don't know because they wouldn't take me seriously. After several futile calls to customer service, I am now a Cingular customer.
First - there are legal barriers that allow you to strip a call of identifying headers. You can press a phone code to turn off your call id, and number forwarding, so that the recieving party cannot trace you. (in the u.s.) This was done so that victims of abuse could call home without fear of being traced. The phone company dosen't get that number either.
Second - as any technologist could tell you, just because a system "should" work a certain way, dosen't mean that the programer who implemented it didn't hack together a fix overnight which worked, so it became a permanent part of the system.
Third and Finally - Even though TV tells you that cell phone triangulation is a common practice, it's not. Triangulating on a cell phone call requires police, on foot, with three antennas, to find the right signal and take a measurement, from there they sit down with a map and work it out. This isn't built into the phone system, and its certainly not automatic. One reason for this is that one of the better ways to triangulate a signal is to measure the signal strength - if cell phone providers measured signal strength at all their towers consumer groups could gain access to those records durring the disclosure period of a civil suit to prove that large regions of their networks do not work sufficently.
Remember, Technology /= Magic.
-GiH
Such a backward country.
About a year ago, I went through a situation with T-Mobile where, when I'd send a text message, it would appear to the recipient to come from another number. And, when the recipient would reply to my messages, sometimes even when the message actually appeared to come from my number, another person would get it. After text messaging and IM'ing with the other party involved, we found that T-Mobile had crossed our numbers somehow. We called T-Mobile and they straightened it out in about 30 minutes. Maybe the same thing has happened to you with regular voice calling? I'd call T-Mobile and have them investigate. Don't bring up ANYTHING you think it might be. Just tell them the situation and let them figure it out.
Anthony Papillion
Advanced Data Concepts, Inc.
"Quality Custom Software and IT Services"
I've got a simple solution to reps hanging up on me, I cancel my service. The problem could be a routing error at their end. I had a $50 phone call on my bill back in 80s. When I called to complain the rep tried to blow it off but I kept pushing. He finally took it off only because I didn't have a single call on any previous bill to Mexico but he was nasty about it and was convinced I was scamming them. They get a lot of bogus calls but they can't bill you for calls you didn't make or recieve. It's sleazy and don't let them get away with it. When in doubt they'd rather see you eat the calls than them.
Every company should have a policy that if a jackass comes in yelling and being abusive, you get security to escort them out. If they repeat, you cancel their account and refund whatever was not used. Period. A company provides you with a service. They can refuse your business.
If a customer comes in with a problem and asks for the manager, then no problem. But jackasses should not be tolerated. After all, 1 happy employee is worth 100 customers.
We can not bother because it's irrelevant to the question. Ask Slashdot isn't really a forum on sexual choices.
It might not belong on Ask Slashdot, but I think I have an idea for the next Slashdot Poll!
I am currently dating;
A. The opposite sex
B. The same sex
C. Cowboy Neil
D. All of the above
It is easier to build strong children than to repair broken men. -Frederick Douglass
Go to the bank and rent a safe deposit box. Call T-Mobile from the bank. State that you are about to prove that you aren't responsible for the calls. Ask for a case number/issue number some item to document the phone call has taken place. End the call and place the phone in the deposit box while in the presence of some official witness. Be sure to turn the phone off. Leave the bank, and wait 1 month for the bill. Then return to the bank, retrieve some record showing that the deposit box hasn't been opened and send a notorized copy of the record via certified mail to T-mobiles customer service division. Be sure to ask if they would like to reimburse you for the safe deposit box, the notory fee and the minutes stolen.
"deals with a lot of shit" could be a comment on sexual activity
Since his mobile provider is T Mobile, a German company, I'd say it is a sure bet.
You called to report suspected fraud, and your service provider's agents hung up on you? Man, I would switch providers that same day. Fuk them. You will need to change your number as well most likely to make sure the fraudster doesn't follow you to the new provider. I'd dump T-Mobile in a heartbeat with that kind of customer service. Since they are a GSM provider, all you'd have to do is unlock your phone, then you could use it on Cingular's network with a Cingular SIM.
http://www.elektronika.ba/projekti/?akc=daj_projek t&idprojekt=3
dpanic (at) gmail (dot) com
Personally I'm just thankful I live in a country where people only get charged for the calls they actually make. I've never understood this idea of having to pay for incoming calls, and fortunately none of the telephone companies have been silly enough to try and introduce it over here in the UK.
1) i see nothing in the article you referenced to imply that *only* 800-number calls can be picked up, across the board. 2) Caller ID: "... This special code does not block the information from companies using Call capture technology ... Emergency services will most likely be able to show the restricted number using a service called Calling Line Identification Restriction Override (CLIRO), or by using general ANI services."
... the idea that "CALLER ID BLOCKED" is a be-all and end-all statement isn't necessarily "moronic", either.
the couple times i've been forced to call 911, they've certainly been able to locate me based on phone signal... and, well, i haven't got an 800-number, nor was i calling one.
so, while technology may not be "magic"
Call care, record the rep's number (this will be the first thing they say to you). Explain that there is a problem - do not try to troubleshoot for them. They will most likely connect you to a technical services group that will examine the facts, and find the appropriate remedy. If the care rep hangs up on you, call again and report to a supervisor the rep's number and the time and date they hung up on you, we'll be out a rep by nightfall.
This is why I stick to tin cans and string!
Now if you're charged for incoming calls during this period, raise holy hell, and include your state telephone regulators in it.
But don't trust anyone else's word no matter how well you think you know them. Lock up the phones completely and see what happens.
"It's the height of ridiculousness to say for those 9 lines you get hundreds of millions."
So, which commandment is being broken?
"I'm interested in selling my youngest daughter into slavery as sanctioned in Exodus 21:7. She's a Georgetown sophomore, speaks fluent Italian, always cleaned the table when it was her turn. What would a good price for her be?"
"Does the whole town really have to be together to stone my brother, John, for planting different crops side by side? Can I burn my mother in a small family gathering for wearing garments made from two different threads?"
"My chief of staff, insists on working on the Sabbath. Exodus 35:2 clearly says he should be put to death. Am I morally obligated to kill him myself or is it okay to call the police?"
- Aaron Sorkin, Anonymous and others / The West Wing / Episode "The Midterms"
Dear Schwab,
Your bias is screaming through your post. We get it, you feel scourned and judged by the world. Great way to deal with that by stereotyping those who you wish to pin the blame on. The AC that posted the completely immature and bigoted response is just an unintelligent person who has an inability to express a meaningful value to connect with his or her feelings. This could have come from a liberal, a conservative or someone anywhere in between. Hate is not a conservative versus liberal issue but a human issue. I would challenge you to consider your own response and ask if your bias against a portion of society was any less hateful. Tolerance does not have to equal acceptance, but it does involve respect and decency.
I even have modpoints...seriously...what is this about? "Help me, my phone bill looks funny and my partner says they don't know" Uhm...so call the phone company, act rational, tell them common sense things like "block this" or "I didn't make these calls" and don't go on strange tyraids about cell phone cloning to people who probably have little understanding of what you are even talking about.
The only change I can believe in is what I find in my couch cushions.
About a year ago I purchased a T-Mobile phone from A1wireless.com. I had problems with the 1st unit and had it exchanged through the online vendor. I believe it was after I received the replacement that I notice phone call from Alabama and other states that I have never been to and where I don't know anyone. Hundreds of minutes of phone calls were being billed to my account that I did not make. I also getting billed for text messages and tons of 411 calls ($1.25 ea). It took months to resolve the issue. I changed my sim card multiple times (didn't help anything), I spent hours on the phone w/ T-Mobile. All I ever heard was that the calls were coming from my sim card thus they were valid calls that I had to pay for. I showed proof that 2 calls took place at the same time so it obviously wasn't me making the calls. T- Mobile can tell what type of phone the calls are coming from so you can ask that. Also when I logged into my account online it would show the other person's phone. After many, many hours of phone calls, and letters written to corporate nothing was really resolved. All I ever heard was that my situation was "impossible" therefore it was not happening. The most they did for me was to change my plan and backdate it so I did not have overages. After a month it did stop and I'm not sure how it got resolved, But I will suggest this... I received phone calls from the friends of the person who's calls I was being billed for. I talked to her friends and they gave me her name and phone number. I gave this information to T-Mobile and of course they did nothing. Eventually, I just started calling her saying that I was receiving her calls and text messages. I told her to call T-Mobile and explain it to them. I assume she contacted T-mobile and the situation was resolved b/c soon after it stopped. My experience w/ the situation was very stressful and the customer service reps were rude and dishonest. I stayed w/ T-mobile b/c I bought a phone w/ the condition that I would get a 100% rebate if I kept the service for 6 months. My contract is up in July and most likely I will change service providers. Good Luck with everything...
Okay so in answer to the posters question:
When you power your mobile on it attatches to the network and is added to the local switches VLR (visitor location register) which is a database of who is on what switch and what radio and base station they are on. The MSC (mobile switching center) then sends a request to the HLR (home location register) which is like a VLR except instead of tracking what radio they are on, it tracks which MSC they are on. So if someone calls your phone, the system does an HLR lookup to see what MSC you are on, and then the call is sent to your current location.
If someone were cloning this persons mobile then they would be attatched to the network 'twice'. This is not allowed and it would cause the 2nd mobile to be unable to attatch to the network.
Think of it like this, your SIM card contains an IMSI (international mobile subscriber identifier) which is a long number that corresponds to your account. When you are attatched to the network it is by SIM/IMSI and the HLR notes which VLR you are in. If a 2nd phone tried to attatch with the same SIM/IMSI information then one of two things would happen because someone can't be in two VLR's at the same time. Either the new SIM would be rejected because the old one did not do a handover to the new VLR. Or the old SIM would be removed from it's current VLR and attempt to re-attach, which would kick off the other SIM/IMSI back and forth.
So if you leave your mobile powered up 24x7 your making it very difficult for someone else to get on the same network and pretend to be you because you can't be in two places at once. And as long as your sim is inserted and your phone is powered on you are attatched to the network, whether you make a call or not.
If you are still concerned have Tmobile set up a call trace on one of these calls or check the IMEI of the calling phone. IF it's in Europe they will have an EIR which keeps track of the IMEI (international mobile equipment identifier) which is like a serial number for the phone. Even if someone cloned your SIM they can't clone your IMEI so it will be different.
With a call trace they can track the LAC and CellID of anycall placed and tell you where it's originating.
Duh.
"Both representatives hung up on me, thinking I was trying to con them or something.". That's impossible! T-Mobile has won the JD Power & Associate award for customer service. They told me this themselves right before they terminated my call.
“Common sense is not so common.” — Voltaire
I would tell t-mobile that I'm leaving their service for a different company. If I ever call customer service and they hang up on me I don't want to deal with that company.
The greatest of all weaknesses is the fear of appearing weak. ->JB Bossuet, Politics from Holy Writ. 1709
Man if you had 2 reps hang up on you then you are either trying really hard to convince them of something that even you are not sure of or you desperatelly need to work on your people skills. Anyway, like several people said it is very hard to clone a gsm phone and this is most likelly not the case. Make sure that you can really trust that your partner did not make those calls before blaming them on some insane idea like cloning. Also when you talk to the reps it usually works best if you restrain yourself from trying to tell them what to do. Yes there are some morons working as reps but most know what they are doing pretty well and would help you. Also if it does turn out that someone else is using your account then the reps will know exactly what to do and they might also help you get you rmoney and minutes back. But like I said good people skills is the key ...
Maybe your assumption about spades is wrong. Maybe you are jumping to conclusions and ought to see if there is a cliff in that direction first. Or a brick wall.
Is your real name Wily E. Coyote?
Infuriate left and right
"No, honey. I have no idea what these anonymous inbound calls to my cell phone could be."
Doesn't sound to me like T-Mobile is necessarily the cheat here.
touche`
You do NOT post on Slashdot about Project Mayhem!
barack to the future?
great ep!
your boyfriend is cheating on you....
the flannel, waxing kind ;)
I'm not a "fag", but Alan Turing was.
/.?
As far as *I* am concerned, you mess with them, you mess with me.
Hey, summer is here. Why not get drunk and play with fireworks instead of posting on
barack to the future?
I notice you say you've noticed only incoming calls. If someone dialed your number and your phone was on, they would normally get you. Have you had anyone tell you they tried to call you when you know your phone was on and not get through, or get hung up on by someone? Can you call TMobile and get a detailed report of calls on your account? That might show which number (you or your partner's) was being called. They may also be able to show you which cell tower the phone was registered with for the start and end of the call.
If they are all calls to your partner's number, I would look seriously at him cheating on you. Have you noticed him taking many private calls lately and moving away from you to talk? Have you answered your home phone to have people hanging up or claiming they got the wrong number? Has he been working out more or taking a greater than normal interest in his own appearance?
If you're worried about cloning, you don't need to just change your number, but get a different SIM card from your phone. That card is what would be cloned and has an IMSI number that is used to register you on the network.
they suck, my phone was stolen and there were dozens of calls made from it to Mexico AFTER I reported it stolen to them. they wouldn't take them off the bill, so I refused to pay what I didn't owe and got a another phone from another provider and moved my wifes phone service as well. ~$50 US cost them 2 customers that were with them for 10 years!
I especially enjoy the tags for this article. yes, cellphones, fraud, no. Why don't we get a little more descriptive with tags like story, slashdot, group of words, stuff.
Check out the cave on the east side of lake Hylia. Strange and wonderful things live in it.
If you're on tMobile, tell them that you're getting "Unable to read SIM card" messages on your phone and that you need a new SIM, which they will gladly send you free of charge.
Then your phone's identity will change when you replace the SIM, and you can have some peace of mind, enh?
Right, now go screw your partner in the ass you fairy
>Here's some advice: Don't take that shit.
That 'shit' comes from the agent taking calls from dozens of people a day, and though the GP might be telling the truth a lot of people are playing dumb and trying to get out of paying their bill..
>You're a human being. But more importantly, you're a paying customer. Call them up, get the guy's name. Inform him that if he hangs up, you'll contact his supervisor. Then ask him what zip code these calls were made from, they should be able to figure that out. Verify that it's something reasonable.
Ah, the paying customer. The bane of a call center agent's life. The agent is a human being as well, please remember that.
Here's a better plan of action:
1) Speak to them nicely but firmly. If you don't get anywhere then stop and consider that they actually cannot help you with your request. Call center agents can NOT see blocked numbers. If the call center agent asks their supervisor or a tech agent for help, those people will tell the agent that the billing system sees what they see. In short, there is no way to see incoming numbers are because they are not recorded by the billing system.
2) If you believe you are getting stonewalled or are asking for consideration beyond what the agent is apparently allowed to give, ask for a supervisor. Polietly but firmly. Repeatedly. If they hang up on you, then you call back and ask the next guy for a supervisor right away. Tell the supervisor about the hangup. The agent will be reprimanded.
3) Keep going upwards if you aren't satisfied. The farther up you go the less the person will want to talk to you. Noone above the customer service agent wants to be on the phone because they have a LOT of other stuff to do..
I am not sure how you think that they can give you the zip code the caller was in.
BTW They don't care that you say that you don't know someone in Houston. From our point of view, your phone talked to a phone in Houston regardless of who was operating either of the phones.
>If that doesn't work, simply demand they change your number for you.
Try just asking if they will change your number. Then ask them if they will waive the fee because of the harassment/billing error/whatever.
>If they refuse to do that, be sure to inform them where you're taking your business.
Now, the agent has to respond to your threat to cancel, and if you go up to a supervisor that's pretty much the go phrase for giving you the moon, but the agent doesn't personally give a damn where your business goes. It's not going to open up information to them that they don't have.
Now, I must say that if you politely bring up the fact that you're willing to cancel your service over the matter, you might get some consideration on refunding fees. This is, of course, if you're actually a customer they make money off of. Don't try this with your $10/mo plan. Oh, and if you don't get anywhere after mentioning the cancel (magic words for the QA team watching the rep) then they really can't help you out.
>Personally, I'd be pretty damned pissed if anyone ever hung up on me when I was simply inquiring as to why they were charging me money. In fact, I know right where I'd file that complaint.
I'll tell you where you can file that complaint, too.
If they hung up on you they are either a crappy agent, having a bad day, or are really offended by your conduct. In any of these cases you're probably not going to get anywhere further with them so ending the call isn't the end of the world. Remember: you can call back.
---
Having been a call center agent for AT&T wireless, I have a better idea of how to deal with cellular agents:
1. be polite but firm
2. if the agent is an idiot (hey, some are) hang up and try your luck again. The hold will give you a breather and the new agent might be one of the good ones.
3. ask for the supervisor. There are multiple, and the first 'supervisor' you get will likely just be another agent. Try th
Call them back, demand that they remove the charges...its that simple. If they indeed have no idea who called, and they can't prove you received the calls...then they cannot charge you for them.
My cell is a Samsung A650, the alarm clock is a Sony ICF-0240.
I've also watched my friend's nextel interfere with his CRT (back in ~2000). It was really bad.
Radio waves affect instrumentation. In a 1998 Honda Civic, the CB (admittedly a little more powerful) we installed caused the speedometer to go haywire and activated the SRS warn light on the dash.
While I think aircraft could be somewhat more immune because of shielding etc, I'm certain that Radio waves aren't totally harmless. This is all anecdotal so take it for what you think it's worth.
It's a fairly common T-Mobile scam, and their reps are trained to do exactly that: Ignore you or argue with you. My neighbor ended up arguing with them long enough to raise her blood pressure to the point of bursting a blood vessel in her eye. Never did get them to deal with the charge, either.
They'll get busted for it eventually, until then, just vote with your wallet.
So if you add up the time 3:28pm + 17 mins = 3:45 pm. The time when I made my call was at 3:44 pm. This reoccurs several times. I still do not think this is enough evidence to convince T-mobile of Phone Cloning. So I am thinking of switching either my number or my service provider.
Call made at 3:28:01, lasts 16m 1s, ends at 3:44:02, gets billed as 17 mins, as most cell carriers round incomplete minutes up.
Call made at 3:44:30.
Your bill would say 3:28pm 17 mins, 3:44 3 mins, but you're failing to observe that those are APPROXIMATIONS. Unless of course you only dial phone numbers at the top of each minute, and every conversation you engage in happens to last multiples of 60 seconds.
More often than not, people forget they called someone or got called by someone, or they don't lock their keys on their phones, or the partner on the plan knows full well about the calls but LIES about it. Having worked (thank God it's past tense) in billing for a wireless provider I've heard it all.
I won't claim it's not possible for your phone to be cloned, but it's unlikely that that is the case. It's far more likely that there's a problem either with you phone itself, your memory, or your partner's honesty.
This might be a con Call Forwarding in action.
I've seen this before: con men call you up and tell you to call a certain number that just happens to begin with the Call Forwarding code (here it is *72). Usually they claim someone you know is hospitalized and to get more info call the "hospital" at the number they give you...
Then they can use your phone to get to that number: they just call you (presumably the NBR Unknown calls you don't see) and get forwarded to the new number, with you paying the cost of connecting from your phone to that number.
Make sure you disable all Call Forwarding on your line.
I have one simple rule when dealing with people - be nice. Be nice for as long as you possibly can. Then lose your shit in the most public, noisy and abusive way that you can. Two spectacular incidents that happened recently are on my blog at http://anonymouslemming.blogspot.com/2006/05/ghost -of-customer-service-past.html
I don't want to have to flip out just to get someone to do their job, and it creates more stress than I need. If everyone just did their job right, the world would be a much happier, less stressed place. It's the age old story of a few people ruining it for everyone :(
T-Mobile does not own the network that it uses for wireless communications.
I'm not sure whose network it uses, but this scenario is very similar to one that my wife experienced a couple of months back. She was recieving text messages from a video rental store that she was late returning videos, but she / we don't have an account there. By chance, when she called the store to complain, the person who had been late returning walked in to the store. It turns out that he had recently purchased a Virgin Mobile cell phone (which leases bandwidth from Sprint / Nextel), and we have Sprint phones.
When she contacted Sprint customer service (and much to her surprise got a real American), he comfirmed that this is an issue, and credited our account for the services the Virgin Mobile customer subscribed to and some more for her inconvience.
Would you refer to your wife as "the woman whose pussy I pump?" "The bitch that sucks my cock?" If so you need to lay off the porn, dude. Not sure where you picked up all that gay stuff, but you've obviously given it some thought or been hitting the gay porn. Usually people leave verbose descriptions of the actual physical methods of their lovemaking out of whatever pronoun reference they use.
The thing is, you don't get to decide what word other people use to describe their relationships. They do. You opinion matter none. If you'd like them to respect your own chosen term and not vomit profanities all over you each time you mention your relationships, then you need to provide others the same courtesy. The only thing that can cause that kind of response is fear. What are you afraid of Mr. Anonymous? Afraid some guy will try and suck your cock or afraid you'll like it?
Oh and by the way Mr. I-feel-so-strongly-about-this-that-i-will-remain-a n-anonymous-coward, Homosexual sex is natural and normal., not to mention fun. Not everybody does it, but ... well you sound like you could use some.
It's obviously not a clone issue. Even if this sim card was Cloned, it would still receive the "unknown nbr" calls. In addition, the bill would probably have other unknown outgoing calls and the user would have several random incoming calls.
Seeing how this person has acted by posting his wild speculations on the Web, I wouldn't be surprised if T-Mobile did hang up. Sounds like someone got a bill that was a little higher than expected, ACTUALLY Looked at the bill for the first time, saw "unknown nbr" and therefor assumed that there was a cloned sim card. Plus there's the probability of the "partner" who may be wise and has someone calling in with caller id restricted. And the overlapping minutes is just ridiculous. If you get a call in on call waiting, you'll have overlapping minutes.
This is something that T-Mobile will unfortunately have to deal with. I can't believe that slashdot posted this to the front page. I'm not impressed.
Wow. What a massively stupid way to drive the entire thing 100% off subject into a moronic discussion of the usage of the word "partner" when it doesn't even matter. Kudos on managing to not just be offtopic, but, an incredible troll. Next time log in, you should be proud of this amazing ability. None of the rest of us could pull of such an incredibly stupid post.
Sorry if someone already posted this, but, it has turned into 5 pages of people war mongering about how much they hate/love homosexuals.
Your "17 minutes" might actually be 16.1 minutes. This is because they get less money if they don't do that. (Plain and simple, that's all it is.) They always round anything they can up. In other words, to ensure overlap, you will have to find an occasion in which even accounting for rounding up (and they always round up, not down) on both ends, the times do still overlap. I know this for a fact from personal experience because I don't use the cell phone much and most of my calls consist of "ok, I'm in front of the store. What was the name of the color paint you wanted? Ok, got it. Bye." Actual call time: in the area of 15 seconds. Call time on bill: 1 minute.
So, your bill MIGHT be more accurately represented as, say (just an example):
2/22 at 3:28.0 pm "NBR unavailable" 16.1 mins usage, round up to 17 on final bill.
2/22 at 3:44.9 pm "123-4567" 2.1 mins usage, round up to 3 on final bill.
In fact, it looks like it could possibly be that NBR unavailable might have even cut out just as you picked up the phone. My first thought would be that maybe it's related to those thoughts of a P2P network on mobiles. If someone could contact your phone and use it while it is idle, then they would possibly be cut off the moment you hit the send button. This is just a thought though. I don't actually have any idea what is actually causing it, and it may be that those two even do overlap, we just can't tell from that is all.
Whatever this is, it is strange though, and I hope you do figure it out.
You can "clone" your phone number but not the phone. It is more likely they "stole" your phone number and used it to call people in your stead. T-Mobile is being a pain when they are not allowing to dispute these calls and charges. This is an serious breach of security on their part where they are allowing an "clone" to make or receive calls and there is no accountiblity in their system for which check for the correct number to correct device. It would be great if this was true and NSA had false records so they didn't track your calls correctly but you are paying for these fake calls.
IMHO I would get out of T-Mobile to another service.
I don't really know. I'm not sure I'm qualified to discern the difference.
Well, actually, you can, or at least could. Sort of. There was a weakeness in the encyrption algorithms of the older SIM cards that let you recover exactly that - the Ki value. As I understood the attack, it involved putting the SIM in a smart card reader and subjecting it to about half an hour's worth of continiuous querying.
I think there was some way you could work out the Ki by sending challange after challange and analysing the responses it gave.
I'd recommend reading this and the subsequent updates linked to from there. Yes, it is from 1998, and I'm hoping that modern SIM cards are more difficult (impossible?) to clone.
It's also possible there are countermeasures too these days built into the SIMs - as you point out, they are active devices.
I have one simple rule when dealing with people - be nice. Be nice for as long as you possibly can. Then lose your shit in the most public, noisy and abusive way that you can.
That won't work in this post-9/11 world....
That kind of behavior will get you waylaid by the CSR/manager while they call the cops to come arrest you.
You forget government is the puppet of 'big' business -- who do you think REALLY supplies government with the ca$h needed to operate? It certainly isn't Joe Public, he doesn't have enough money to 'talk' loudly enough to get himself heard like the fatcat businessmen have at the corporate level.
That's why America's bipartisan political system is basically 'two sides of the same coin': Big business is ALWAYS in control!
I saw on MSN today that US AG Gonzales is crowing about 'nailing' some potential terrorists trying to 'bring down' the Sears Tower and what not. Come on -- another 9/11-style attack is old news -- the terrorists are REALLY JONESING on making THE SUM OF ALL FEARS a reality! all they need is a 'nuclear state' (such as North Korea) who is sympathetic to their cause to give them a nuke to float into a famous seaside harbor in the USA like LA, NY, or Miami with the expected , cataclysmic results. As far as I know, there is too much cargo to check to find the bomb before it does it's 'nuclear thing'. Another possibility would be to sneak it over the Canadian/US border out west where there are NO guards or fences to get past--just a 'cleared path' marking the border between the two countries!
The best thing to do is to give the oil rich states a fair price for their natural resource instead of trying to 'rip them off' by de-stabilizing their government then moving in with military force to occupy them. A 'Golden Rule' style U.S. foreign policy would have likely prevented 9/11...
You do of course realize that there are non God believers who think homosexuality is stupid and make sport of the fairier sex? (fairier, lmao, I made a funny) Nice knee jerk, there, one dimensional thinking turd. (I can't believe I just flamed on /. but I had to do it)
Karma: Bad is the liberal way of saying this guy won't drink the kool aid here on slash dot. I wear my Karma with pride
You know what else lots of animals do? They run around naked. They eat other animals raw. They piss wherever they happen to be standing. They have sex in public. It would not be considered natural and normal for a human to do any of this.
I am gay myself and I am sick of hearing that homosexuality is good or bad because it is natural or unnatural.
Hurricanes, earthquakes, cancer, miscarriages, and a trillion other terrible things are completely natural. Clothing, roads, buildings, medicine, and a trillion other wonderful things are completely unnatural.
Homosexuality being good, bad, or neutral has nothing to do with how natural it is.
You must be a fan of Hitler.
I had them bill me for $1700 in one month!! It was more them 24 Hour of use for more then 30 days worth of minutes, they refued to even disuss it with me and sent it strait to collections before the bill was even due because I verbablly refused to pay it!!
I am always doing that which I can not do, in order that I may learn how to do it. - Pablo Picasso
Your future self may be using the phone after the discovery of time travel. You need to get a patent!
No message. No message. No message
Hi Slashdot. I'm a typical computer geek. I can't talk to anyone without coming off as a know it all asshole. When I'm telling a help desk that I know exactly what has happened to my phone they hang up on me. I don't understand why they would do that. I only tell them that they are stupid and I know everything. Please help me how do I deal with the people who don't understand everything I do?
I use my cell more than my land line and I pay less for the cell.
Maybe I don't understand the question. Is this a response to someone? I've never heard of someone paying more for a call on the basis of the recipient being on a cell. Is that what you actually meant?Ops, I shuld have usd the prevuwe but in.
Eeeeeeeeeeew!!!! :-)
It's crazy sharing property with someone you aren't married to, unless you do it via shares in some sort of corporation.
I have now heard enough comments on the mis-behavior of many
large company SUPPORT and HELP-CENTRES, the solution is to issue
the writ, in local court first.
No call centre guy wants to responsible for his company failing
to answer a writ!
I agree with you. Most run of the mill fraud is detectable with after the fact auditing. And certainly many kinds of telephone network fraud imaginable could be detected that way. In my experience such fraud detection is not given a very high priority even AFTER the fact. And much of the fraud looked for is only the kind of fraud that the people involved have dreamed up themselves. Often the best developers are needed to implement new features without causing the entire system to fall apart, so it is the developers who are more prone to write buggy code which are involved in writing auditing code. These guys were less involved in the system design however, and are less qualified to even know what is and what is not fraud. The internal politics and psychology of a telco make fraud detection fairly expensive compared to the actual amount of fraud. (this however minimizes the cost of making carrying live phone traffic). Lately there has been so much emphasis on downsizing and/or merger as well that the problem is compounded; the departments that are usually first on the chooping block are the non-revenue centers. i.e. auditing.
We are really only concerned with large scale and cost-effective to prevent fraud. Something akin to the easily defeatable copyprotection schemes on some CDs (which really only stop casual copying). And I suspect most companies are like that. Consequently.. if you complain that a phone call you made never happened or was of a much shorter duration.. we are most likely to simply take your word for it, make a note and delete the call. Hell.. we know there are bugs in some of the 3rd party technology we use, and we don't want to piss off our customer and make them feel stupid.
At the end of the day, the act of physically carrying a particular call is NOT the major expense for a telco. Most of the cost is tied up in developing/maintaining/owning the CAPABILITY to carry the call. The paying customers are supporting that capability. After that a few lost calls doesn't really make much difference. as long as the fraud is only a small percentage of total phone calls (hopefully happens during non-peak hours) and doesn't trigger customer service calls or loss of service, then I can say that there just isn't much business rational to do anything about it. It is illogical to spend $100,000 to detect $1,000 worth of loss. And this seems to be the inevitable terminal condition for any fraud detection operation in the company. It gets to a point where too little fraud is being found and then you stop trying.
finding cloned sims is probably something to make a routine however. it is too obviously a serious area of potential fraud.
No one has a right to their *own* opinion. They have a right to the TRUTH.
In the future I would like to do something like that, however, hoenstly....
Its a matter of who you choose to do it with. I had the right friend, not a hugly close or good friend, but the right kind of friend, one with good buisness sense and an honest person. We both lived on the premisis and rented out rooms, split everything down the middle.
I wouldn't do that with just anyone. Some of my best and closest friends arn't the people I would enter into a serious buisness arrangement with. Was there risk? Hell ya, but it worked for us and 3 years later, I own the place on my own. Frankly, in this area, its the only really viable way to swing it. In the end though, its a buisness, and you have to treat it as such, and be partnered with someone who does also.
Realise that as we did it, we could leverage firsttime homebuyer programs and other goodies. I would think that a corperation (admittedly I havn't looked into this) would be more problematic, because the bank will consider it higher risk (like an income property, ie a place you don't intend to live) so a higher downpayment (typically 1/4 of the total value) rather than 20% that a normal private party sale can get away with.
-Steve
"I opened my eyes, and everything went dark again"
And there are some homosexuals who think heterosexuality is stupid?
Well actually mostly just distasteful....;) After all, women are good to talk to, nothing more!