‘Can you hear me?' Don't answer that!

It seems harmless enough. A person answers the telephone or a cellphone, and the voice on the other end asks "can you hear me?"

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Don’t say yes, officials warn. In fact, don’t say anything. One word could make a person the victim of a scam that is circulating across the United States, CBS News reported.

A person's affirmative response can be recorded and used to authorize unwanted charges on a telephone or utility bill or a stolen credit card, CBS News reported. When payment is demanded and that person refuses, the caller may produce the previously recorded assent, the Idaho Statesman reported.

"You say 'yes,' it gets recorded and they say that you have agreed to something," Susan Grant, director of consumer protection for the Consumer Federation of America, told CBS News. "I know that people think it’s impolite to hang up, but it’s a good strategy."

But if the caller has not provided a payment method, how can he or she be charged? The con artist already has your phone number, CBS News reported, and many phone providers pass through third-party charges.

What can you do? If you suspect you have already been victimized, check your credit card, phone and cable statements carefully for any unfamiliar charges. Call the billing company and dispute any unfamiliar charge authorizations.

If the caller asks you to press a button to be placed on the Do Not Call Registry, hang up, the Idaho Statesman reported. Saying anything or pressing buttons when prompted may help scam artists determine that you have an active phone number. Remember that no government agency will ever solicit for the Do Not Call Registry, but you can register your number at DoNotCall.gov. This will stop legitimate telemarketers and business from soliciting you, but not scammers. So, if you are on the list and get a call, you can be that much more confident it’s a scam.

Officials urge people to be skeptical when taking a call from an unfamiliar number, the Idaho Statesman reported. If a caller is asking questions that would generate a "yes" response, a good answer is "Who are you, and why do you want to know?"

http://www.wsbtv.com/news/trending-now/can-yo ... that_/488434730

Thanks Alfalfa!
This is a common tactic of telescammers.
They get you to answer a "Yes" to any question, record that audio, and then mix it into a different question audio to then justify billing you or your account.
A "Can you hear me OK" question becomes a "Do you authorize $$$$ reoccurring charges..." on tape.
The old Phone Book Update / Yellow Pages scam used this trick almost exclusively.

To further protect yourself or your company's phone account better, have the telephone provider activate "Anti-Slamming" protection on the account.
It is basically a two-factor protection.
If a telescammer sends the provider billing for some "service" for your account of which they provide a cobbled together audio script of your "confirmation", your provider will contact you first for final confirmation before they accept and apply it. If you do not confirm it, they reject the telescammers billing request.

One thing, this isn't exclusive to phone services/billing.
Medicare and Insurance Fraud scammers do this too for those Pain or Diabetes "survey" calls.
They record your Yes answers, glean some insurance info from you, then later you find out they are billing your insurance / Medicaid, in your name, for stuff you are not getting.

In related, since December, there have been many posts about an intro that includes something  alone the lines of "Hold on, my headset was not working".  But I think that is associated with Robo Calls, trying to fool the person into thinking they are talking to a "Live" rep.
Now I am trying to remember if the "Busted Headset" intro includes a "Can you hear me?" question.  Maybe we should have a link to this tread or the info in the Lastest Articles?

It all boils down to do not answer unknown calls.

Another tactic scammers use if they have your name is "May i speak with ( insert your name)?" Do not answer yes to this either for the same reason as above. If you think it may be a legitimate call it is always best to answer with 'speaking'

Or more commonly the phrasing is "Am I speaking with (name)?

The caution bears repeating, but hack editing of responses into a bogus verbal contract is hardly a new tool of fraud. I have my own blunt force defense which I'll discuss in a moment.

We're also getting this prodding lately from call centers which use soundboards, from my experience and those reported by others. So far I've heard the "can yuh hear me okay" prompt from cruise travel/timeshare creeps running a fake survey, and also similar canned prods from "hero charity" rooms, which shake cans for "fallen police", fearless firefighters, and breast cancer "ladies who count on your support". The prod for reply tends to come early in the call, even if there was no pregnant pause to spur one.

I speculate that recording an "admission against one's interest" is not the goal there, but softening objections and call management. First, prompting for affirmatives is a well worn sales tactic. Get the prospect saying "yes" repeatedly to your bullet points, goes the theory, working up momentum to the "yes" which closes the deal. Second, the original Echo System can be set up for two or three calls to be handled at once by a lone operator. I would guess one needs to "tickle" some call recipients to triage the three active calls and concentrate less on the ones which become dead ends.

My reasoning comes from hearing stall tactic audio samples, such as coughing and laughter, those asking me to repeat myself, and the canned rep claiming misunderstanding or a sudden bout of deafness. I tend to frustrate the scripted flow of desired responses by answering their questions with my own questions and otherwise offering circular, not-quite-committed replies. Sooner or later I often hear multiple non sequitur samples tossed at me as the wage slave short-circuits and hurries to dump our non-performing call.

As to using my own clipped words against me, I never worry because all of my phone traffic is recorded .... all of it ... usually at a high quality sampling rate. I use dedicated hardware, but my VOIP carrier also offers the feature, and I see several software solutions for both desktop and mobile systems. If strangers on the phone want to abuse the E-SIGN Act and pretend I'm a paying client, I'll tell them to meet me at USDC with a settlement check in my name, or else I'll submit my affidavit with attached media files and watch them drown in their lies.

I suggest calls with mystery Caller ID and Name information appearing on phones be answered :
"This call will be recorded for quality assurance"
if the call is answered at all.

Similar things here. My number one rule is to never use the word "Yes" in a conversation with a telemarketer., exactly for the editing concerns discussed here. Like you, majority of all my calls are recorded as well.

I would think this is more fraud in these cases, rather than "yes" conditioning, since it seems there is little to no continued solicitation in these cases. However, if they do launch into a pitch, you can see the "yes" conditioning at play.

As for the pressing 'X' for opt-out letting them know the number is working - they already know that from the call connection response.  Typically one of Answered, Not Answered, Busy, or Out of Service. Any of the first three lets them know the number is working.  So if you answer, block, or ignore, they know. My experience doesn't indicate that my numbers are being sold by answering - mainly because I'm not buying anything. Most likely it's via war-dialing.  However, if you do donate to a charity/etc by phone - then you can count on your number being sold. I just don't press 'X' to opt-out simply because it doesn't do anything.

For the sound-boarders, I tend to play along nicely. I want to get past them to the higher-paid and smaller number of "closing" agents as quickly as possible. This is the handful of people tend to have the higher close ratios to disrupt, since they assume the robocall/sound-board did all the work to pass them a self-selected "high-value" lead. And then they get me. They also tend to be closer to the actual business behind the telemarketing campaign - which is more useful for FTC complaints.

The scam calls regarding "Job Inquiries" are suspected to be in the same lines. You deny having expressed interest. They repeat what you said and end with, "Is that correct?", one answers, "yes" and the call ends. A few elderly couples have reported this in my town.
Best solution which has been repeated over and over by many "regulars" while giving advice is, "IF YOU DON'T RECOGNIZE THE NUMBER, DON'T ANSWER THE CALL."

I don't even answer the phone anymore.    Unless I positively recognize the caller or number, I just let it ring.

Or how about "Who's calling?"
Then while they're babbling their BS reply, push that button that sends 50KV into their headset. (I know, we don't have those--yet. (evil grin smiley goes here}

Agreed. And if they can't be bothered to leave a message, then either (a) it was spam, or (b) just a wrong number. I usually assume it's (a) if they call more than once, and don;t leave any messages. Usually I block 'em after the second call with no message.

Be sure to ask them to mail you their written do not call policy, and if they refuse or say they will but never do, report it here. The FTC and persons who post here and want to sue them will appreciate knowing details about the written policy they are required to have available to be mailed upon demand.

Nice, I'm sure the robocall strike force is working on that ;)