Nice try (but failed).

I worked in overseas telegrams many years ago and am pretty au fait with computorised telecommunications. Over the years, I have perfected my replies etc. (I really do record things ) I inform who ever contacts me, that all my phone calls are recorded, that my son - the policeman , has already explained the type of things they do, and checks my phone recordings every day. If they persist in speaking their spiel and refuse to go I finish off with a police whistle which I keep by the phone and once hopefully half deafened some scumbag who decided to phone me with unpleasant sexual comments. Rhey have picked the wrong one if they think I am going to fall for any of their rubbish!!

I keep a whistle by the phone too! Would love to see their faces when I blow it!😱

I have only once had a mildly obscene call. The voice sounded familiar although I could not place it. I mentioned this to DH.

Some years later, by then DH had moved jobs. Something suddenly triggered recollection and I realised who had rung me. It was DH's manager at the time. The previous evening had been the annual company dinner dance and he had danced with me several times.

I get a dozen or more attempted scam emails a week, easily seen, reported (to [email protected] ), and deleted.

We hardly ever get dodgy phone calls (we've a landline) and they can easily be detected as recorded voices which click into action when someone answers (they must call zillions every day?).

We're on the Virgin Media system, I've never yet got them to answer the question:- "Most of the phishing emails we get are from scammers pretending to be Virgin Media, wanting an excess payment, etc --- as it's YOU that processes and delivers those emails, YOU can see they are not really FROM YOU, so why don't YOU zap them before they reach ME?!".

Oh, PS, if you receive a dodgy TEXT, forward it to 7726. You can also report scam calls by texting 7726 with the word "Call" followed by the scam caller's number.

PS2, In MY world, I'd have a couple of scammers a week executed. They could try and save themselves, by having friends and family phone a number to make a charity donation, then after they'd paid, a further message would kick in to tell them that they needed to pay £X more to reach the 'save' target. And £X would keep increasing . . .

LOL - a woman after my own heart Dr Watson.....

These scammers do do damage - even if we catch onto them being thieves, rather than people, before they have the chance to catch us out.

Every attempted theft is another little "nail in the coffin" in our faith in human nature and our mental scales dividing the human race between "thieves" and "normal people" sinks down further and further on the "thief" side of that equation and we wonder more and more what proportion of people are "thieves" that we're having to share our planet with....

Two phonecalls or emails from thieves and another article about what the Israeli Government are up to now and that's quite a cloud of despair descending for the day....

I get very few spam/scam emails. One or two a month max. The same with phone calls

For many years. I just picked up all calls and said nothing for about 5 seconds and when I heard the tape recorder click off, I put the receiver down. If there was a real person with a reason for ringing me, they would speak first and I would explain what I was doing. They always understand.

I read somewhere that now making these calls is an industry the managers have software that sorts through the numbers dialled and drops any number where there is consistently no response when the number is dialled. They do not want to waste time ringing numbers that seem either dead or defunct.

CariadAgain
The vast majority of people working in these call centres arnt thieves. Many of them are prisoners sold to the 🤬 who are keeping them prisoners in the compounds.
www.aljazeera.com/features/2025/5/30/each-person-had-10-phones-trapped-in-a-cyber-scam-centre-in-laos

A picture of just one of the complexes. Some are so huge they are like a small town.

Petra This is why I do not speak at all and just put the phone down. if I do speak to any of the scammers I am always polite and dismissive. I am only too aware that many of the scammers are coerced.

I would never, ever indulge in some of the behaviours listed above like blowing whistles because I am too aware that many of these scammers are not choosing to do what they do.

This seemed the best thread to put this on. Phone call this morning which, while distracted, I answered. Allegedly, I had made a complaint about problems with my property to the Housing Department. I hadn't. Hung up quickly but beware - it's an 0203 number scam.

Apologies if this has already been mentioned, but regarding any concerns about various kinds of "scams" (by phone, online, or otherwise) it's worth looking at the Action Fraud website (run by the police as a nationwide support).