Why would somebody else phone up my mobile phone provider to say my phone was lost and could they block incoming and outgoing calls?

My phone company said they do it sometimes so that you don’t get the text message from your bank or similar while they get up to no good, but all bank, cards, etc. are fine.  What could they be trying to do by blocking my phone from making and receiving calls, texts, etc.?

Cancel, get a replacement sim make lots of calls/data use on there etc. with your sim/number your 2 factor authentications are out too.

Or they typed the wrong number in

In a previous job I called up our IT department, imitating the MD, who was on a business trip to Japan. I told them that my phone had been stolen and they had to block it immediately.

All has become apparent.

While my phone was blocked they phoned my credit card company and changed my phone number on my account to theirs.  Today they’ve then gone on a spending spree and passed every security question – even had a copy of my passport FFS!

Scary stuff.  I may be a while cleaning up and redoing all my personal docs…

Crikey, that’s pretty scary.

I wonder how they got your passport!

Wow. I’d be interested in how the hell they’ve done that short of burgling your house.

Wow. I’d be interested in how the hell they’ve done that short of burgling your house.

For various things I’ve had to use my passport for ID, from banks to some registrations and visa’s. Some are photocopies and some are scans, there are scans on my cloud accounts along with photo’s from various times. Any one of them from a bag of shredding not shredded or hack of a phone – text 2 factor authentication?? could get a copy

Bought a house late last year so sent all the anti-fraud docs (oh the ironing) via email. So I guess they hacked my email account.

Bloody hell! That sound like proper KGB style espionage. 😳

Bad luck but thanks for sharing. It is good to know this as a technequt to watch out for.

Bin ninja’d?

So I guess they hacked my email account

Or has access at the other end.

jam bo – this is way worse than having nina hide under my bed, but a nice blast from the past nevertheless!  😎

Matt – aye, they could have access from the mortgage broker’s account too, but I’m still changing everything.

This is a bit captain hindsight, but immediately after being burned is the best time to make a change..

1. Use multi factor for as much stuff as possible (ESPECIALLY email accounts)

2. Use a password manager such as Lastpass, so you use a different (secure) password for every site or service you use. Then all you have to remember is a single strong password / passphrase to get into that (again with multi factor).

Not infallible but with a bit of luck that should keep you clear of trouble.

Google have just instigating 2Factor ID on GMail, so I’m going to set that up soon. Got it on my Apple stuff, so makes sense.

Google have just instigating 2Factor ID on GMail,

Has this post been stuck in a loop somewhere? It’s been about for years!!

Exactly the same happened to me a month ago. Still no idea where the security breach was from.

Interesting – do you also use a bitcoin exchange? Aside from visa applications that’s the only time I’ve been asked for a scan of a passport etc. and some of them aren’t the most reputable companies around. Although the most likely scenario is email/cloud storage ‘hacked’ via cracked password etc.

I had similar last autumn, credit card blocked and after 2 weeks I was finally told that my account was cloned somehow. In the meantime I’d had a letter confirming and thanking me for the increase on my credit limit. The ***** had then tried to spend the max at John Lewis, it’s a JL card, and were only rumbled when they were on the phone confirming details and got my first name slightly wrong when asked about some details. They had everything else. The only way I can think of was my passport was taken at a hotel in Trinidad so had the majority of my details. Counter fraud asked whether any post had gone missing etc.

Similar happened to my wife five or so years ago.

It started off receiving phone calls in middle of night but when answered there was no-one in the line. Then her phone stopped working. Phone Vodafone and told there was a technical problem with her phone or account by their foreign call centre a number of times. After four days they reinstate her account but don’t explain anything else.

After the weekend she went on a work trip and her card is declined. Account emptied of thousands of pounds.

Vodafone finally admitted wasn’t a technical problem but fraudster had cancelled her Vodafone account so she couldn’t get notifications from bank and setup online banking on her account (she didn’t do online banking then). Phone calls in middle of the night were obviously fraudster checking to see if phone had been turned off yet before they plundered the account.

I still blame Vodafone for not telling us what was happening with her account in the first place. It took ages to sort it out with them and get the early cancellation fee refunded. Unfortunately Vodafone at the time were the only service provider which worked in our area so we had to continue using them.