Call Forwarding Scam: The Department of Telecommunications has advised people to check the settings of their mobile phones for call forwarding.
New Delhi:The Department of Telecommunications (DOT) of the Government of India on Thursday issued an advisory to the users regarding unknown phone calls made with malicious intentions. In this, crores of mobile users of the country have been alerted about the new method. The Department of Telecommunications has asked people to be alert from such incoming calls, in which you get an unknown number after dialing ‘Star 401 Hashtag’ (*401#). But are asked to call. This allows scammers to access ‘incoming calls’ of all associated users and can be used for fraud.
Be careful about calling an unknown number by dialing *401#.
Let us tell you that if a user calls an unknown number after dialing ‘Star 401 Hastag’, then all calls received on the user’s mobile will be traced back to the caller. It gets ‘forwarded’ on the phone of an unknown person. This is called Call Forwarding Scam. Nowadays, cases of such fraud are continuously increasing.
This is how you become a victim of call forwarding scam.
The Department of Telecommunications has advised people to be alert from such incoming calls made with malicious intentions, in which they are asked to dial ‘Star 401 hashtag’ and then dial an unknown bill number. According to the statement, in this type of fraud scammers call a user. He describes himself as a customer support representative or technical support staff of his telecom service provider.
After this he says that either there is a problem with his SIM card or there is some problem related to the network or service quality. Then, the customer is asked to dial a special code to fix the problem. This code usually starts with ‘Star 401 Hashtag’ and is followed by a mobile number. Once this is done, unconditional call ‘forwarding’ is activated to the concerned mobile number.
When people’s mobile calls start getting unconditionally forwarded to unknown mobile numbers, it allows scammers to access all incoming calls. They cheat people through this.
Check the settings of your mobile phone.
The Department of Telecommunications said that telecom service providers never ask their customers to dial ‘Star 401 hashtag’. People are advised to check the settings of their mobile phones for call forwarding and if the facility of call ‘forwarding’ is provided by dialing ‘Star 401 hashtag’ then turn it off immediately.
