Hi All...

had a call yesterday at around 5:20p at the shop. telltale clue that it might be a marketer cuz of the delay and clik after answering with "hello?". them: "this is merchant review.. can i speak to the owner?" me: "no. we're closed." them: "oh.". me: <click>.

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Aug wrote to All <=-

had a call yesterday at around 5:20p at the shop. telltale clue that it might be a marketer cuz of the delay and clik after answering with "hello?". them: "this is merchant review.. can i speak to the owner?"
me: "no. we're closed." them: "oh.". me: <click>.

I have a realtor in the area who had my telphone number (I've had it
since 2015, I still see my number on her marketing materials when I
google it...)

I used to get people calling for her, I'd get creative with my
responses, like holding the phone and yelling "Hey, is Barbara back
from rehab yet? No?" then ask if I could take a message. Or, forwarding
them to my friend who is a competing realtor.

I called her at her new number and she told me that it wasn't her fault
and I should "call google".

Now I'm getting calls from American Express looking for payment.



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On Fri, 5 Jan 2024 04:45:00 -0800
Kurt Weiske <0@700.218.1> wrote:

had a call yesterday at around 5:20p at the shop. telltale clue that it
might be a marketer cuz of the delay and clik after answering with "hello?". them: "this is merchant review.. can i speak to the owner?"
me: "no. we're closed." them: "oh.". me: <click>.

I have a realtor in the area who had my telphone number (I've had it
since 2015, I still see my number on her marketing materials when I
google it...)

Google search results still put up a lot of outdated info. It's pathetic. Perhaps it's not Google per se, but the products like independent aggregators that skim the 'net, build resultant pages and never change them. Then, Google keeps finding those.

I used to get people calling for her, I'd get creative with my
responses, like holding the phone and yelling "Hey, is Barbara back
from rehab yet? No?" then ask if I could take a message. Or, forwarding
them to my friend who is a competing realtor.

Ah.. PHONEGAMES!

I had a business number with the last 4 digit 1704, but the local CanadianTire's number ended with 1074. So.. I'd get calls asking for a variety of things. I had plenty of opportunity to play games with that and misleed people, but that would be cruel. <G>

I called her at her new number and she told me that it wasn't her fault
and I should "call google".

I dunno.. it's a waste of time. I remember getting the odd call claiming to be FROM Google. I had my doubts about the legitimacy of that.

Now I'm getting calls from American Express looking for payment.

Ha! Just put them on hold, or if you can see the number on your display, block it?

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August Abolins wrote to Kurt Weiske <=-

I had a business number with the last 4 digit 1704, but the local CanadianTire's number ended with 1074. So.. I'd get calls asking for a variety of things. I had plenty of opportunity to play games with that and misleed people, but that would be cruel. <G>

When I was a telecom manager, I bought a new bank of DID numbers for my
company. I assigned the lead number of the bank of numbers to the phone
in my switch room, and as soon as I saved the change, it rang.

I picked it up, and it was a wrong number for a museum. Thinking about
it, It seemed likely that a museum patron would have an old number
written down somewhere instead of looking it up. :)

I dunno.. it's a waste of time. I remember getting the odd call
claiming to be FROM Google. I had my doubts about the legitimacy of
that.

I'm getting SPAM calls from "Google Voice Verification". They keep
asking for the "business owner". Not sure what they want to charge for,
but when I ask them to take me off of their list, they double down with
what great value they offer - or once, told me it wasn't his job to
take me off of their list and I "need a secretary".

I've got around 60 calls logged, am considering taking them to court.




... What is the reality of the situation?
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First all, apologies for starting this topic here where it does not belong. :( I'll be posting subsequent replies in CHAT.

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To: Bob Worm
Re: had a call yesterday at around 5:20p at the shop. telltale clue that
By: Bob Worm to Kurt Weiske on Sat Jan 06 2024 10:53 pm

Ughh... this reminds me of when I was in university and some guy called "Baz" had given out my number to *everyone* thinking it was his own. I would be woken up at 3am by his wasted mates during the week, then at 7am on Saturday morning by his dear aunt. I politely asked her if, when she eventually caught up with "Baz" she could please tell him he was giving out the wrong number. She told me I was being rude.

i had a guy named t-bone/gino who had bad credit and people after him who gave out my number instead. then his aunt would leave long msgs begging for money.
i would call her back and she wouldn't answer. i would leave a msg saying wrong number. still kept calling and begging.
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Re: Re: had a call yesterday at around 5:20p at the shop. telltale clue th
By: August Abolins to Kurt Weiske on Sat Jan 06 2024 01:35 am

Google search results still put up a lot of outdated info. It's pathetic. Perhaps it's not Google per se, but the products like independent aggregators that skim the 'net, build resultant pages and never change them. Then, Google keeps finding those.

I've searched my name online and found sites that I've never visited that have a "profile" of me.. It's a little creepy that there are sites that do that. Aside from (probably) telemarketers, I wonder who's even looking at these generated profile pages.

Nightfox
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To: Nightfox
Re: Re: had a call yesterday at around 5:20p at the shop. telltale clue t
By: Nightfox to August Abolins on Tue Jan 09 2024 12:08 pm

I've searched my name online and found sites that I've never visited that have a "profile" of me.. It's a little creepy that there are sites that do that. Aside from (probably) telemarketers, I wonder who's even looking at these generated profile pages.

Nightfox

i spent several months deleting myself online. i had to keep doing it because they all share the same lists. right now it only shows a few things i posted
on public sites.

people who look you up are looking at these online profiles.
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