How to report phishing and scam calls

If you have had an annoying phone call or fax of any kind, there is one way to deal with it and help everybody else by getting the culprits taken care of.

First, please make a note of the details of the call or calls.
This includes:
the number that called you,
any information from Caller ID
the date and time of the call
the number that you received the call on.
It's important to note if you receive it on a mobile phone.

Then, you can report the call to the FCC on the internet.
The web site I will give will ask you for some personal information.  This is secure because it is an official FCC web site.  It's no different than making a report to the police, except that this will give you a result.
The web site has several options for reporting the problem call. You can report it using an online form, or print out a form to complete and mail in.
The easiest and best way is to use the online form.
It is easy to complete, and you get an acknowledgement for your own records, so that you can call them up if the calls continue.
This is the only way that is guaranteed to have some action taken.
Here is the web address:
http://esupport.fcc.gov/complaints.htm

March 22, 2011 -  A man with a thick island or African accent called, said his name was James Brown from Publishers Clearing House and I had just won $250,000 and a new car. He wondered if I wanted a public (televised) or private delivery of my prizes.  He then gave me the name of a lawyer (Cynthia Madison of Williamsburg, Kentucky) and instructed me to go to my nearest WalMart or KMart where there was a Western Union office.  I was instructed to call him at 1-876-856-7303 when I arrived there.  After hanging up he called back and reminded me that I would need to purchase a receipt from Western Union in the amount of $499 so my prizes could be delivered today.  I immediately got into my car and headed to my bank to withdraw the $499 and get right over to WalMart....NOT!  Really, I called the sheriff's department. There's little that can be done except to share this experience with you all.  This number is associated with the country of Jamaica and is usually one of those numbers that if you call back you will have a lot of unauthorized long distance charges on your phone.  So don't call it back, even though it might be fun to mess with them, it's not worth it.

Hi, your post is mirrored at https://800notes.com/Phone.aspx/1-876-856-7303

I have just received a call today, at 11 AM from a man with a heavy African accent who said his name was William Steinberger and who represented the Institute for Endowment in Washington, DC.  When he said his name, I could tell it was fake.  He further said that I had won $490,000.00 and asked if I had received the letter sent to me.  I said I had not and further I asked him where he was from.  He said Philadelphia, PA.  I said no, your accent is more from a continent, say, a country named Nigeria?  He asked me why I thought he was from Nigeria, I told him he had an African accent and if he wanted to scam others he had to get someone with no accent and a better name.  I told him that Steinberger was a Jewish name and certainly did not fit an African accent!  I then noticed he clicked the phone off.  I immediately pushed * 69 and found out his phone number.  He was calling from Wash. DC all right. The number was: 202-521-2440.  Not bad for a a 73 year old senior citizen ha?

I've moved your post to:

https://800notes.com/Phone.aspx/1-202-521-2440

I just received a call from a man that spoke with an Indian accent saying that the department of treasury chose me and a number of people for a grant of $8000 towards a home renovation, medical bills or education. He asked for my account # or debit card # so that it could be deposited directly because by mail a check of that amount could get lost so I told him I didn't have a bank account and that he could mail it so he just stuttered for a minute and said that they would call back in 30 mins to get my mailing information, yeah I doubt that. I feel bad for the poor uninformed person that will actually believe this.

Government Grant Scams
Although government grant scams have been around almost as long as the government itself, the majority of the sites being advertised today didn't exist before the November 2008 election.

http://www.consumeraffairs.com/news04/2009/03/grant_scam_ads.html
http://www.consumeraffairs.com/scam_alerts/grant.html
http://www.consumeraffairs.com/news04/2009/03/ftc_stimulus_scam.html

FEDERAL TRADE COMMISSION WEBSITE      
http://www.ftc.gov/bcp/edu/pubs/consumer/alerts/alt134.shtm

‘Free Government Grants’: Don’t Take Them For Grant-ed

and right here on 800note - 16 ways you can be phone scammmed
13.    Caller ID Spoofing: Generally, the scam works like this - you receive a call where total strangers pretend to be someone else and they back up their claims with spoofed Caller ID. The scam artists might then ask for money, demand a payment, request your personal information, addresses, or banking info. People report getting calls from 'Secretary of State', grandchildren, law firms, IRS, and government officials.

o In another variation of this scam 'government officials' call to offer a 'Government Grant': 'Because you pay your income taxes on time, you have been awarded a $12,500 government grant! To get your free grant, simply give us your checking account information, and we will deposit the grant into your bank account!'  You may receive a message like this, where the caller claims to be from a government agency or some other organization with an official sounding name. The caller might claim that you will qualify to receive a "free grant" to pay for education costs, home repairs, home business expenses, or bills. In any case, the claim is the same: your application for a grant is guaranteed to be accepted, and you'll never have to pay the money back

Prize Offers: You Don’t Have to Pay to Play!
http://www.ftc.gov/bcp/edu/pubs/consumer/telemarketing/tel17.shtm

excerpt from Federal Trade Commission link

A Dozen Ways to Protect Yourself
The next time you get a "personal" letter or telephone call telling you "it’s your lucky day," the Federal Trade Commission encourages you to remember that:

1.    Legitimate sweepstakes don’t require you to pay or buy something to enter or improve your chances of winning, or to pay "taxes" or "shipping and handling charges" to get your prize. If you have to pay to receive your "prize," it’s not a prize at all.

Spam/phishing phone number 888-590-0284reporting ... this number call's home or cell retrieving all numbers who call to enguage attacks on phone mumbers stored.

Spam / Phising number 503-457-1062 ... these spamers use ur service up to 5 mins charged to ur cell phone number ... hang up immediately on this number each time or they get ur email information too

Got the text about bestbuydraw.com on April 28th 2012 from +12523057436 Saying I've won a gift certificate. SCAM

I called back one of their fake numbers and I heard a recorded woman's voice saying the number was disconnected but the tone of her voice made me suspicious cause she sounded like she was [***], like she had something to hide.

10/16/2012 - 3:10pm

Received a call from a man with a heavy Indian accent claiming to be James McCullam with the Microsoft Certified Tech Dept in their local Indianapolis office.  Gave me a call back number of (317) 620-7791.

This man said that he was calling to assist me in removing a virus from my computer.  He could not name this virus or tell me how he knew I had a virus without knowing any details.

He said he could fix my problem for free.

I asked to be removed from whatever list my name is on, and he said that to remove my name from his list, it would cost me $550.

I advised him that I have a degree in CIS and am able to manage my own security, and continued to push him for details about what he was wanting me to do... when I said, "so basically, you are asking me to give you remote acess to my computer..." he hung up on me

I called the number he gave me above, and it said this number has been disconnected.

Got the same thing on my mile phone as reporter above.  Guy called from UPS Package services to deliver my car and furniture that I had won (dispute having never registered or bought a magazine from PCH).  First time he called the number was private.  Told him I was not interested.  Second time I didn't pick up.  Third time his number showed as 876-899-0393.  I picked up that time because I now had a number.  He did his whole bad English with what sounded like a Spanish accent story.  I asked for his name and number he told me Mr. John Thomas (I guess like the fast food restaurant CEO, that is deceased) with a number of 954-957-0066.  

I didn't learn much else.  At that point I told him he will have to find someone else to try to Spear Phish, and I would be handing his info over to the FBI.

Although, I don't know exactly where to pass this info off to as I'm not sure if anyone in the US Govt.  does anything with this info.  If anyone knows the where I should pass this off to please post it here.  I doubt the FBI have time to deal with these idiots, but maybe there is another agency with a directive of keeping them in check.

We need a Fraud Detection Agency to deal with stuff like this.