56k Stealth Dialer Scams

[Yarisboy]

I'm sure everyone has heard of them, they secretly download themselves on to your computer while you're innocently browsing the web, and on your next connect they bypass your default number - whilst you're blissfully unaware of your phone bill significantly creeping up by £££.

For a half competent PC user they're fairly easy to spot, stop, delete, etc.

However me old ma has just been stung by one of these, one of the worst being £34 for 26 minutes connected.

It makes me angry that the people who run these things seemingly have no morals, it's paramount to robbery.

I phoned BT to find out who the offending number belonged to, and after a lengthy wait on hold, all they could tell me was "It's a non-adult premium rate number". Well thanks for that, very useful indeed.

They would not disclose the name of the company, a contact etc - due to the data protection act. Wonderful. So now these criminals are being protected and I can't find out who they are.

There MUST be people here, people everywhere who have had bad experiences with these dialers. If anyone is aware of a watchdog or forum group i'd love to join in and do my part to oust these thiefs.

It's robbery, nothing more.

Anyone here had dealings with these scumbags?

The dialer that got my mum is called 'Global Access' and the number on the phone bill is 09053 840039.

Any help greatly appreciated.

[Chappers]

Do you know what the 'funny' thing is?..wait for it.. Who supplies the lines for the prem rate? Who makes money from calling the prem line?.. BT, that's who..

[Fidgits]

thats not exactly true chappers, BT does charge more for premium rate lines, as it should...

From a legal standpoint sam, any premuim rate line MUST, by law, advise you of that before you connect, and in this case it didnt...

[Cubic Incubi]

i thought a decent firewal stops this?

have you tried using mozilla firefox?

[Moffmo]

have you tried using mozilla firefox?

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Never had any adware, spyware, malware problems since i used firefox..

In short, IE is a piece of shi**

[Yarisboy]

I installed zone alarm pro, AVG antivirus, ad-aware, etc and firefox months before this happened.

Whether or not she's used IE and got it that way I don't know, there's only so much I can do to help, lol.

I realise that it's illegal fidge, but what can you do when the identity of the company/firm/person(s) behind the dialer is unavailable? :(

[Fidgits]

Sam, you report it to the police, their fraud team will be able to get the details, and prosecute.

You can them take them to the small claims court to get your money back ;)

[Chappers]

What I was trying to say is that BT should take some responsibility for issuing these prem lines/numbers etc.. They hand them out like sweets. Ok, so the whole procedure may have gotten a little tougher, but still

[Yarisboy]

After some research I've discovered that the who 'dialer' thing is up in parliament for review, so it's obviously affected alot of different people.

There's horror stories of these things taking literally £thousands from different people.

I'll have to think whether I want to get the police involved or not...

Cheers for the advice though fidge, and everyone else for their responses.

[Robie]

I dont think BT could do much to the owner of the premium rate phone line because it could be someone completely unconected to the company with the phone line just wanting to do something malicious.

[System~G]

This scam was covered by Fair Deal a couple of weeks ago. It appears there's nothing people can do but pay the bill or face getting the line cut off by your bill provider. Which in it's own right is a scam.

If your OS and IE is updated regularly (once weekly or more often), run AV and a firewall, you shouldn't have problems

[CraigT]

I work for a very large ISP here in the UK and I can tell you that it does cause a lot of problems for people.

Unfortunately its one of those things where nobody is willing to accept responsibility. As another user said above you usually have to click 'yes' to download them, however saying that, these messages are very often vague at best.

For example "click yes for global access!!!" which can easily fool the not so computer savvy.

If your mum was on broadband via cable (such as telewest or ntl), AND had her dial up modem cable disconnected from the telephone socket these diallers have no way of connecting and incurring high call charges.

Ive seen bills for hundereds and hundereds of pounds caused by diallers :(

[+Steve]

You Need to Contact ICTIS... regulators

Also by Law premium line carriers are not allowed to hold the call for longer than 30 minutes. So she would have been cut off anyhow. But thats not the point.. these scum monitor each dialer.

I myself have been to an adult call centre and see how it all works.. I can tell you millions are made... certainly opened my eyes for sure.

Give the number to ICTIS and tell them you wish to proceed further.

[Yarisboy]

Thanks guys, I think I will take it further - i.e. to the ICTIS, it's not so much the money, but the principle.

btw, the £34 was derrived from two calls, each 13mins and 20 seconds exactly, and following each other by a couple of seconds (the time it takes for 56k to verify & connect)

As suggested above, i'm sure there was a 'click yes to download gobal access' type of popup - but to the computer-oblivious (which i'm sure is what they prey on) ... anyway, that point's been made already.

The local exchange is finally being made DSL ready on february 9th, and i've bloked all premium rate numbers from her line - scanned the computer and sorted it out etc

It won't happen again, it's just the anger of knowing you've been robbed... but not being able to do anything about it because BT won't help.

I will take it to the ICTIS.

Thanks again,

Sam

[DazH]

One of the lads I work with got grief off his missus as she rang BT to find out what the excessive bill consisted of to be told 'oh it's some sort of !Removed! dialler' World war 3 then erupted!! He see's the funny side now but they still had to foot the bill <_<

If more people take it further as you're going to maybe it might just help to put these crooks out of business

[Robie]

I have physically removed my internal modems to stop this happening. I doubt it can but does anyone know if it can still happen on a cable line?

[Demonic Angel]

I know Watchdog have been covering this for a while - heres their advice:

http://www.bbc.co.uk/watchdog/advice/internet.shtml

ICSTIS is definately the best way to go and I hope you get it sorted.

The people who runs these scams are just scum. :censor:

[Ken]

I've never had this type off problem but on my landline i did get one and i complained to OFTEL who sorted it in under 1 hour, maybe worth a try?

[CraigT]

I have physically removed my internal modems to stop this happening. I doubt it can but does anyone know if it can still happen on a cable line?

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Not possible on a cable line due to the way these diallers are designed:

Cut off customers dial up connection > dial into premium dialler > customer doesnt notice.

With a cable broadband connection this isnt possible, but could still be a mild possibility if you still have your old dial up modem cable connected to the telephone socket.

[System~G]

This scam was covered by Fair Deal a couple of weeks ago

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Ooopps meant Watchdog

[Crisis]

have you tried using mozilla firefox?

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Never had any adware, spyware, malware problems since i used firefox..

In short, IE is a piece of shi**

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I completly agree since I made the switch.

Spot oN!

[Robie]

But dont get complacent, I have noticed popups are starting to get through firefox as It has become more popular more people are trying to figure ways round it :)

Thanks CraigT for the heads up.

[CraigT]

If anyone is interested. Microsoft have now created their own anti-spyware program which is free. Might be a good alternative to Ad-aware and Spybot etc. Then again it may not, I havent tried it myself yet.

You can get it here:

http://www.microsoft.com/athome/security/s...re/default.mspx

[vmail]

I think OFTEL is now called OFCOM

Get broadband so you dont have to worry about auto dialer (sypbot can detect these)