Yes, Your Own Phone Number Is Spamming You
By now, we’re all used to receiving spam texts: messages purporting to be from your carrier offering you a “gift” to pay your bill, or from Netflix asking you to open a link and “renew your subscription.” These attempts to rob you are not unusual. What is unusual is when these messages do not come from someone else’s source, but from your own phone number.
Receiving spam text from your own number does not mean that you have been hacked, although at first glance it may seem so. You grumble as you receive another terrible spam, but you notice that the attacker is not some unknown scammer, but you .
But no, your number has not been compromised, and this does not mean that hackers have stolen your information. This type of spam attack is called “spoofing” when an attacker sends a message not through their actual email address or phone number, but from any source they like, including your own phone number.
These phishing attempts are as ridiculous as they are transparent. Good job spammers: you’ve figured out how to send a text from my own phone number, and you’re using this ability to do the same scam as before. Why should I think the scam is real this time when it looks like I sent it to myself?
Can anything be done about the problem? Well, you have the same two options as when you receive any spam messages: you can report them to your carrier or file a complaint with the FCC .
But what happens when you give your own phone number to your carrier? To report spam text, you first forward it to 7726 (SPAM) and then add the sender’s phone number to the message. Hey, this is your number now. What good will it do? Moreover, telecom operators are already well aware of the content of these types of spam messages and seem unwilling or unable to deal with them effectively.
This leaves the option of reporting them to the FCC, which may be your best bet – the more formal complaints an organization receives about this issue, the more likely it is that they will pressure operators to act and find a real solution. However, none of the options seem to be particularly effective. There is little you can do as a consumer to stop the spam coming your way. Carriers really need to address this issue on their end.
And it goes without saying, but please do not interact with or open these spam links. While they are sometimes harmless — there have recently been reports of fake texts that only lead to a Russian state television website — some links can lead to more nefarious places.
[ Fringe ]