A a few weeks ago, I woke up to a text message on my smartphone. It wasn’t my editor or a needy friend in another time zone. It was a message from myself.
“Free Msg: Your bill is paid for March. Thanks, here’s a little gift for you” the text from my own phone number read, pointing me to a web link. In online forums, many Verizon customers have reported the same experience.
Scammers had used Internet tools to manipulate phone networks to message me from a number they weren’t actually texting from. It was the same method that robocallers use to “spoof” phone calls to appear as though they are coming from someone legitimate, like a neighbour. Had I clicked on the web link, I most likely would have been asked for personal information like a credit card number.
Consumers have struggled with cellphone spam for years, in the form of robocalls with scammers incessantly ringing to leave fraudulent messages about late payments for student loans, audits by the Internal Revenue Service and expired car warranties.
Verizon confirmed it was investigating the text issue. A few days ago, it said it had fixed the problem. “We have blocked the source of the recent text messaging scheme in which bad actors were sending fraudulent text messages to Verizon customers which appeared to come from the recipient’s own number,” said a spokeswoman.
Representatives for AT&T and T-Mobile said they had not seen the same problem. But text spam affects all wireless subscribers, and carriers now offer resources online for how people can protect themselves and report spam.
“Spam texts are just increasing at a much more drastic rate than spam calls,” said Giulia Porter, a vice-president at Teltech.
The most common text scam is the message impersonating a company that is offering a shipping update on a package, such as UPS, FedEx or Amazon, says Teltech.
Be on the lookout for these telltale signs of a fraudulent text —
n Scam texts typically come from phone numbers that are 10 digits or longer. Authentic commercial entities generally send messages from four, five or six-digit numbers.
n They contain misspelled words that were intended to circumvent wireless carriers’ spam filters.
n The links in a scam text often look strange. Instead of a traditional web link composed of “www.websitename.com,” they are web links that contain sentences or phrases, like droppoundsketo.com. This practice, called URL masking, involves using a phony web link that directs you to a different address.
First and foremost, never click on a link or file in a suspicious message. Definitely don’t reply to such a message either. Even typing “STOP” will indicate to a scammer that your phone number is active.
If text spam is becoming overwhelming, spam-filtering apps like Teltech’s TextKiller are meant to help. The app, which blocks spam texts for $4 a month, scans messages coming from phone numbers that are not in your address book.
TextKiller was thorough — perhaps too thorough. It caught five spam messages in five days, but it also erroneously filtered two legitimate messages, including a response from Verizon thanking me for reporting spam and a message from an AT&T spokesman.
A more practical solution is to use free tools to minimise interruptions from spam texts. On iPhones, you can open the Settings app, tap messages and enable an option to “filter unknown senders”. On Android phones, you can open the messages app, enter the spam messages settings and enable “block unknown senders”.
Finally, both iPhones and Android devices include the ability to open the settings of a message and block a specific number.
We can prevent spam from flooding our phones if we stop sharing our phone numbers with people we don’t fully trust. That includes the cashier at a retail store asking for our number to get a discount, or a website when we sign up for an account. A better idea is to carry a second set of digits, which can be created with free Internet calling apps like Google Voice, that we treat as a burner phone number.
The next time a scammer tries to send you a text from yourself, it won’t come from your number.
NYTNS