2010 BT Network Hacked(again):customers told to pay(again)

[Steve__M]

CC1: Have you spoken to other neighbours?

Have you at least managed to get BT to log your complaint, and got a reference number.

Is there any local paper or something similar in Honiton where you can get the word out.

In my estate a number of people have reported the issue to the Police. That may be worth doing. Maybe mention that PC Sharon Tooze in Exeter has collected some reports.

I have asked at work, and am contemplating putting up a poster on our estate notice board.

[CC1]

I havent lived here long so dont know many of the other neighbours.
Ive asked BT for a ref but all i get is 'its been logged and on your record' When i ask to speak to someone in authority i get cut off!
There is a weekly free paper in Honiton but the main one is the Express and Echo
My next step is to report it to the Police

[El Gringo]

http://blogs.mirror.co.uk/investigations/

[Steve__M]

I have just noticed that CC1 is reporting the same number as Beebeebuzz, who is in Clyst Heath Exeter. That info might help in getting BT to do a refund.

[mike99]

Everyone affected here should report what is going on to http://www.phonepayplus.org.uk/outpu...complaint.aspx.

I realize that PhonepayPlus are about as much use as a chocolate fireguard, but they are the only fireguard we have. At least if people report these incidents, PP+ cannot pretend they are not aware of what is going on. They may even do something.

Certainly, nobody should pay BT a single penny of the cost of these calls. If you make it absolutely clear that you are going to stand your ground and explore every avenue of complaint and appeal open to you, BT will capitulate - rest assured. They don't have a leg to stand on here and would never risk bringing these issues before a court*.


[*Obviously anyone considering getting involved in legal proceedings of any kind should take independent legal advice]

[a_n_other1]

I have just noticed that CC1 is reporting the same number as Beebeebuzz, who is in Clyst Heath Exeter. That info might help in getting BT to do a refund.

Originally Posted by Steve__M

I have suffered the same problem as others on the same number 09829 319 990 and also live in the Clyst Heath area of Exeter, so it definitely sounds like there is a problem with our local phone exchange or network.

After speaking to Sky twice they advised I write in which I have just done so will see where that goes, nice to know it is not just me though!

[Steve__M]

I have been informed by my local PC that BT have finally reported the incident to the police, and that people no longer need to report individual cases to the Police.

This may only apply to 09829323380 or to BT customers - I do not know.

I expect CC1 will be pleased to see that there are now two reports of 09829319990 in Clyst Heath (Beebeebuzz and a_n_other1). Might be worth calling again to see if they are aware of the police report by BT.

I reported this at work and got two new responses from Clyst Heath residents, which seems quite a high "success" rate.

The Police do advise the people continue to check their bills and insist on refunds.

[El Gringo]

Your local PC is wrong. If individuals are victims of theft then each of those individuals should report those thefts to the police.

Steve who do you think hacked into the BT Network and placed those fraudulent calls?
Steve who do you think committed the theft from the BT customer accounts?

[Cormoran]

'Anythingwilldo' is with Talk Talk, are all the PR calls being made from the same local exchange?

[Steve__M]

If the phone provider refuses to refund the call, then I agree that the incident should be reported to the Police.

Reporting the issue before an attempt at getting a refund could waste my poor PCs time and stop her dealing with the bothersome mini-mopeds that ride around our estate!

Once the money is refunded, the the Police will take the view that you are no longer a victim and "close the case" (I know this having experienced an incidence of ID fraud).

I do accept that this gives the service provider an opportunity to close down the investigation and brush things under the carpet by withdrawing the complaint, which is precisely what was done in my ID fraud case!

I will contact my PC and ask her whether they are able to insist that BT disclose the number of calls made to the dodgy numbers.

[El Gringo]

@ all
i have been reliably informed that the complaints 'received' are typical of calls being made from local exchange boxes by somebody who has 'hacked' into them.

This is not the first time that BT has attempted to hide this!

Steve__M
Your local PC is wrong. If individuals are victims of theft then each of those individuals should report those thefts to the police.

Steve who do you think hacked into the BT Network and placed those fraudulent calls?
Steve who do you think committed the theft from the BT customer accounts?

[Steve__M]

'Anythingwilldo' is with Talk Talk, are all the PR calls being made from the same local exchange?

Originally Posted by Cormoran

I am aware of most calls from Kings Heath and Sowton, some calls in Pennsylvania,
one in Dawlish and two in Honiton.

I would guess the first three are the Exeter Sowton exchange. I don't know about Honiton and Dawlish which are about 15-20 miles away.

[CC1]

Ive still not received anything from Phonepayplus but have reported this to the police. i have just rang BT again, told them ive complained to PP+, informed the police, and that the local press have been involved. Within seconds I was told my next bill will have the refund on it!!! I asked what exchange Im on, unfortunately he couldnt tell me!?! I await for the next bill in Sept!! Im not holding my breath though

[silver]

you can work out your exchange via http://www.samknows.com/broadband/exchange_search

[El Gringo]

http://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/....php?t=2584033

BT are aware of this issue and are investigating, affected customers will be refunded

Originally Posted by BT Company Representative

it's odd that they only become 'aware' that their fraud monitoring system(AIT) is flagging a fraudulent billing pattern when a journalist starts asking questions.

[Cormoran]

'ACTION FRAUD' is part of the Attorney Generals Office which covers all types of fraud, telecoms and other. Not too sure what they actually do about it but I think it may be worth registering your complaints.

http://www.actionfraud.org.uk/node/86

[El Gringo]

http://whocallsme.com/Phone-Number.aspx/09829323380
http://whocallsme.com/Phone-Number.aspx/09829319990

http://www.thisisexeter.co.uk/news/B...l/article.html

summary of the problem

BT are allowing criminals access to their roadside cabinets to place premium rate calls on the phone lines they are renting to their customers.

The sole purpose of this(for the criminals) is to collect a share of the revenue they know BT are going to demand/extort from their customers.

BT can see from their AIT monitoring system and the associated localised pattern of complaints that these calls are being made from hacked points on their network.

BT extortion

If the victim attempts to withhold the money BT will disconnect their service.
BT will then sell the victims details to a third party debt collection company and in the process completely trash their credit rating.

[Steve__M]

Who said phonepayplus was toothless?

Their response today to my complaint made 2 weeks ago:

The issues you have raised in your complaint are of concern to us and we are working hard to address this on a wider scale. In doing so, we investigate rigorously those cases where there is strong evidence of consumer harm and also work with the industry to stamp out bad practice, to ensure no one else experiences the problems you have faced.

On this occasion, we will not be opening a formal investigation into the service you reported to us, but we have made sure details of your complaint are recorded fully and maintained for future reference. Should we receive any further evidence of complaints or risk of consumer harm about this specific service we may open an investigation at that time.

PS. TalkTalk's investigations are progressing rather slowly. They phoned me on Monday to confirm my details in advance of them contacting BT. The person had at least one other customer to contact. I told her it was in the press etc.

[Cormoran]

Who said phonepayplus was toothless?
Their response today to my complaint made 2 weeks ago:

The issues you have raised in your complaint are of concern to us and we are working hard to address this on a wider scale. In doing so, we investigate rigorously those cases where there is strong evidence of consumer harm and also work with the industry to stamp out bad practice, to ensure no one else experiences the problems you have faced.

On this occasion, we will not be opening a formal investigation into the service you reported to us, but we have made sure details of your complaint are recorded fully and maintained for future reference. Should we receive any further evidence of complaints or risk of consumer harm about this specific service we may open an investigation at that time.

Originally Posted by Steve__M

@Steve_M

In answer the the first red highlighted question, the answer is 'everyone'.

The second red highlight shows they are going to do nothing about it even though it should be investigated. You must remember PP+ is financed by the same people that are doing the scams.

You have done as much as you could, well done.

Did you get the charges refunded?

[Steve__M]

I *was* being sarcastic . I replied to the PP+ email but won't hold my breath.

I'm still letting the wheels turn on the refund, which they have promised to do. I don't think it will be an issue.

[Cormoran]

I *was* being sarcastic . I replied to the PP+ email but won't hold my breath.

Originally Posted by Steve__M

@Steve_M

I gathered it was a 'tounge in cheek' remark......



Keep at them for the refund.

[El Gringo]

Their response today to my complaint made 2 weeks ago:

The issues you have raised in your complaint are of concern to us and we are working hard to address this on a wider scale. In doing so, we investigate rigorously those cases where there is strong evidence of consumer harm and also work with the industry to stamp out bad practice, to ensure no one else experiences the problems you have faced.

On this occasion, we will not be opening a formal investigation into the service you reported to us, but we have made sure details of your complaint are recorded fully and maintained for future reference. Should we receive any further evidence of complaints or risk of consumer harm about this specific service we may open an investigation at that time.

Originally Posted by Steve__M

@Steve
about a week ago
Phonepayplus said they had received a number of complaints from the Exeter area and the complaints were typical of someone breaking into and calling from a roadside cabinet (although they had no other 'evidence').

They also said they had alerted BT and the other Networks.

I believe BT Wholesale manages the 'billing' for TalkTalk

in the same way the manage the billing for Virgin Media.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UsKOtb4pm00

ps the two numbers involved in your case belong to Oxygen8

[El Gringo]

http://www.the-scream.co.uk/forums/s...9&postcount=53
11-July-2010

PhonepayPlus has the following information about the premium rate number 09829323380.
and
PhonepayPlus has the following information about the premium rate number 09829319990.
gives

The number offers an Adult Content service. This is promoted through various sources including magazines, the internet and television and you use it with your telephone or mobile phone.
This service costs £1.50 per minute (plus any phone network surcharges - check with your phone company for full details).
If you would like to find out more about this service you should contact the company listed below.

Call Republic Ltd
Somerset House
40-49 Price Street
Birmingham
B4 6LZ
0845 0099 899

so anybody who find these numbers on their bill and goes to the Phonepayplus number checker will be mislead into believing these are connected to a genuine service.
how helpful!

changed within the last day or so

Unfortunately PhonepayPlus does not have any information about the premium rate number 09829323380.

Unfortunately PhonepayPlus does not have any information about the premium rate number 09829319990.

If you want to log a complaint to PhonepayPlus online please click here.

Alternatively, you can call our helpline on 0800 500 212 (Mon-Fri, 0800-1800).

You could also contact your billing phone company (such as BT or your mobile phone company) and ask them for details about this number and advice about what to do next.

Want to find out more about Phone-Paid Services?

PhonepayPlus endeavours to publish accurate information concerning the services identified by its number checker, but it does not guarantee the accuracy or the content of such information, and cannot be held liable for any losses of any kind howsoever arising as a result of any reliance, or usage of, such information.

disgraceful

[El Gringo]

22-July-2010

Their response today to my complaint made 2 weeks ago:

The issues you have raised in your complaint are of concern to us and we are working hard to address this on a wider scale. In doing so, we investigate rigorously those cases where there is strong evidence of consumer harm and also work with the industry to stamp out bad practice, to ensure no one else experiences the problems you have faced.

On this occasion, we will not be opening a formal investigation into the service you reported to us, but we have made sure details of your complaint are recorded fully and maintained for future reference. Should we receive any further evidence of complaints or risk of consumer harm about this specific service we may open an investigation at that time.

Originally Posted by Phonepayplus

Originally Posted by Steve__M

http://www.phonepayplus.org.uk/upload/PPP_AR_2010.pdf

Scoring a complaint:
How the triage system works

We have introduced a rigorous three-stage process for assessing complaints. At stages 1 and 2 the complaint is scored against a set of criteria, from 1 (low-risk or where there are mitigating factors) to 5 (high-risk or where there are aggravating factors).

Stage 1 is scored by the Consumer Support Team member who receives the initial complaint. The team member scores the complaint by asking the following questions:

• How misleading does the service appear to be?
• How likely is it that other consumers will be affected?
• How vulnerable is the complainant?
• How good is the evidence?

To ensure that this triage system is as objective as possible, this initial assessment is passed at the end of every day to the Prioritisation Team.

At this point, we aggregate all complaints and their scores so that we can ork out the average score of complaints relating to an individual service. We will then score each service against a further set of criteria, asking:

• Is a re-offending service or provider involved?
• Have they reneged on compliance action promises?
• How many similar complaints have we received about the same service?
• Is there a pattern suggesting systemic abuse?
• Is there no work underway to resolve the underlying harm?

Based on this score, the Prioritisation Team assigns a priority level from 1–3,
where 3 is urgent, 2 is important but not urgent and 1 is less urgent.

To guarantee that the process is as watertight and objective as possible, there is a third stage. Every week, the Allocations Team meets to consider and moderate all scores and to decide on the action to take. At this point the Allocations Team can ask for more information on which to base that decision, such as a clearer picture of the likely impact on consumers by requesting revenue figures from the provider.

so as we have always suspected. When serious fraud and criminality is involved they deal with it 'in house'.

this criminal theft through network hacking has been going on from at least 2004.

[Steve__M]

For what it's worth, I submitted another complaint to PP+ to request that they correct the information by stating that investigations into its fraudulent use are underway.

Also, yesterday I got another response to the message I posted at work from someone in the Exwick area of Exeter.

Anyone interested in statistics might like to draw conclusions from the fact that I got 4 responses from a workforce of about 1500 of which a proportion don't live in Exeter, a significant proportion won't have read my message, and a significant proportion won't have subsequently checked their bills.

So we have 20-30 in Clyst Heath and Kings Heath, a couple in Pennsylvania, Exeter, one in Exwick, Exeter. Two in Honiton and one in Dawlish which are 10-20 miles from Exeter.

[Steve__M]

Response to my latest complaint:

PhonepayPlus is responsible for regulating the promotion, operation and content of all premium rate services. These include services operating on numbers beginning with the digits 090, mobile phone services accessed via a five or six-digit short code, and directory enquiry services.

We are very grateful for alerting us to your concerns about the following service:

Number: 09829323380

The above number is a n incorrect number, please provide us with the correct number.

Words fail me

[El Gringo]

just a little while ago

Unfortunately PhonepayPlus does not have any information about the premium rate number 09829319990.

PhonepayPlus has the following information about the premium rate number 09829323380.

There is currently no service operating on this premium rate number. Should you require further information, please contact the Service Provider whose details are given below.
This service costs £1.50p per minute (plus any phone network surcharges - check with your phone company for full details).
If you would like to find out more about this service you should contact the company listed below.

Call Republic Ltd
Somerset House
40-49 Price Street
Birmingham
B4 6LZ
0845 0099 899

so what were they trying to hide/protect?
http://www.the-scream.co.uk/forums/s...8&postcount=83

[mike99]

OK, done:

Dear Sir/Madam

Re http://www.phonebrain.org.uk/article.aspx?menuId=540




First the statement “It is possible to bar calling premium rate from your phone”. This is untrue. Most networks do allow their customers to block outgoing calls to 09 numbers (essential if you have children or live in an area suffering from “artificial traffic inflation”) but Sky does not allow this and PhonepayPlus and Ofcom insist that they have no powers to force a network to allow 09 call blocking.

Secondly the statement “It is not possible to bar premium rate texts”. This is also untrue. Both Vodafone and T-Mobile allow their customers to block incoming reverse charge SMS. There is no technical reason why all the networks could not also allow this, but they choose not to. Again, PhonepayPlus and Ofcom insist that they have no powers to force the networks to allow customers to protect themselves from this form of theft.

Please could you correct the information on your website ASAP.

Yours faithfully

etc


They will probably ignore this at first, but (don't worry) I shall pursue this matter with whatever tenacity is required.

Originally Posted by mike99

As predicted, they did ignore me. So I wrote again. They got back to me today. They are "looking into [my] comments"

[El Gringo]

but Sky does not allow this and PhonepayPlus and Ofcom insist that they have no powers to force a network to allow 09 call blocking

Originally Posted by mike99

http://www.google.co.uk/search?q=sky...g&start=0&sa=N
sky "Other phone numbers that starts with: 090" site:whocallsme.com

sky top boxes just love dialling revenue share 09

[Cormoran]

but Sky does not allow this and PhonepayPlus and Ofcom insist that they have no powers to force a network to allow 09 call blocking
Originally Posted by mike99

Originally Posted by mike99

@Mike99,

Sky eventually allow you to block outgoing 0900 numbers but not without talking to several departments and insisting that you want outgoing premium rate numbers blocked. The sting in the tail is that they also bar international calls as part of the package.