Scam calls are a nuisance at best, because they’re intrusive, and a social and financial evil at worst, because they prey on those who are vulnerable.
You probably get dozens or hundreds of them a year, often in waves of several a day, where the caller claims to be from Amazon (about a credit card charge charge that doesn’t exist), from Microsoft (about a computer virus that isn’t there), from the police (about a copyright infringement you haven’t committed), from your bank (about suspicious transactions that haven’t actually happened), from the tax office (about penalty charges you don’t owe)…
…or from any of a number of sources that fraudulently put you under pressure to agree to do something you later regret, such as transfer money from your bank account, hand over personal information such as passwords or payment card details, or install malicious software that lets the scammers remotely rummage through your computer.
Scammers of this sort are typically based in high-pressure criminal call centres outside your country, but they make use of internet-based calling services that costs pennies a minute to make calls anywhere in the world, yet show up on your phone with a local number to give them an air of legitimacy and traceability.
Not quite a scam
Sometimes, however, the callers aren’t quite scammers, and they really are based in your country, working for a registered company, calling from a number that really is local.
They might be promoting…
