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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. "
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!
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
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.
I've had very bad experiences with T-Mobile. Last week I called to INQUIRE about their prepaid plan, and a couple days later, I found they had switched me over to it without my permission. After three calls, I managed to get them to switch back to my old plan. However, my mobile email no longer works, and the CSR I spoke to told me I never had mobile email for the past 2 years. She actually claimed I had imagined sending and receiving all those emails from my phone. Another CSR believed me, and claimed he could fix the problem, but he was unable to.
So... after 5 years with T-Mobile, I am ditching them due to the morons I spoke to. The only other GSM game in town seems to be Cingular. They have mobile email, but it's only MSN, Yahoo, AOL, etc.
"The advanced societies of the future will be driven by competing systems of psychopathology." -JG Ballard
net time you loose your phone, call the service department and tell them you lost your phone. they will pleasantly give you the location ( within 1 block ), the last 20 phone calls, and send that phone a text message. I've done this 3 times and got my phone back 3 times. it's all in the manner that you speak to the reps. also it does not hurt to keep your GPS active ( that helps pinpoint the phone to 1 block ).
Onepoint.
if you see me, smile and say hello.
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"
As an employee of a cell phone company who works in Customer Care I'll offer my two bits.
1) When you call customer care ask for and write the down the Care agents name. If they hang up on (unless you are being incredibily agressive and swearing) that information will be handy to their Supervisor. Call back and let that be known.
2) Both the IMEI number on the handset and Sim Care will be recorded. If both do not match on a disputed call this is strong evidence of cloning.
3) You have 3 way calling, you have voice mail - two calls at one time is not an anomaly in itself.
4) Ask for a Supervisor if you do not recieve care at a lower level.
5) View your online account and watch you billing daily if you think this is a cloning problem. Trying to remember a call from 5 weeks ago is not easy.
6) Don't dispute calls in general. Dispute specific calls. We can look up specific calls. Saying I have 47 billed minutes I didn't use means nothing. Saying, the call to 123-456-7890 on 6/03/06 at 2:57pm was not made by me. We can actually help with that.
7) Correspond via email instead of calling. Over the phone pressure exists to keep the lenght of the call down. Via email agents can research your issue without having to leave you on hold - the pressure for resolution in a 5 minute phone call is not there.
8) When you hear this often in a Call center you do become immune to it. People lie all the time - a popular one is "I have bad coverage" only to find out after reviewing their account that they've used 2800 minutes this month and are happy to accept a discounted handset with a 2 year deal. People with truly bad coverage do not renew for two years and have 2800 minutes usage per month. As such, it is easy for a Care agent to dismiss you without much investigation. Do not give up after 1 or 2 calls (or email). This does not mean that you are right, merely that your issue will be investigated more thoroughly the second or third time. This is normal in many businesses.
That isn't entirely true. I've worked in intercarrier billing for a little while, and I have seen many cases where ANI (Automatic Number ID) is not sent by the originating carrier.
Now when you make a normal phone call from a normal world zone 1 LEC (local exchange carrier) to another world zone 1 LEC or wireless company, your LEC is almost always going to transmit that data. They don't have to do it, but they usually do it. Generally it makes it much easier for the techs and the billing people when things work this way because it lets you determine if a call is interstate/intrastate (different rate tables) or it can help you track down technical problems of all kinds.
However, not every carrier sends this information. In fact, carriers with older or less complicated equipment (think phonecard companies and small international operators) sometimes can't even send ANI if they wanted to. Maybe they don't use SS7 and are using the ANI field to an identify an internal billing code. Maybe they have incompetant switch techs who don't know how to setup the signaling correctly. There are lots of legitimate reasons why a carrier would not send out ANI.
Now for the criminals--- it is VERY EASY to spoof ANI and CLID. Many telecom scams are perpetrated this way. All it takes is for the criminal to be placing calls through a carrier which allows the customer to transmit digital signaling and then sends out whatever the customer sent to the next carrier rather than building ANI from the carrier's own customer database. Virtually all LECs let you do this if you have a T1 and a PBX. Virtually all small VoIP operators let you do this as well, so long as you have the ability to transmit the signaling to them.
So getting back to the point, your carrier isn't neccesarily lying to you when they say you got a call from 'number unavailable'. Its entirely possible for a carrier NOT to get a call without an ANI. With a little research, they may be able to tell you what carrier the call originated from, but thats about it.
Triangulating a mobile phone to within a couple of hundred meters (frequently less than that) does not require police on foot, with three antennas. The cellular system, in order to work and not for any sinister big-brother type reason, has to track the rough relative position of a subscriber within a cell, to account for signal delay propagation.
Just to elaborate a bit about timeslots: The GSM standards require that the phone transmit only in a defined time frame: three time slots after the phone has received the data. This gives the tower a well-defined interval during which to receive the data transmitted and to ensure that transmissions by different phones are separated by at least one guard period.
But as the distance between the tower and the cell increases, the cell phone must transmit earlier and earlier to account for the increase signal propagation delay. This process is called "adaptive frame alignment" and is determined by a parameter known as the "timing advance" parameter. The TA is dynamically updated and takes values between 0 and 63 inclusive. This parameter determines how early, in microseconds, the phone has to begin transmission, to ensure that the signal reaches the tower at the correct time, and roughly locates the phone within a specific radius around the tower.
Combining this with the fact that more than one tower usually sees the phone and the information from those other towers, the GSM system can triangulate the signal to within a couple of hundred meters, easily.