Police have issued a warning of a new scam which has reached Australia after doing the rounds in the US and UK earlier this year.
It is a phone scam where the scammer calls people on their home or business number and asks: "Can you hear me?"
Police have adviced to hang up immediately if you receive this phone call.
If one doesn’t hang up, but says ‘yes’, the scammer, reportedly, records the ‘yes’ response and ends the call.
The recorded ‘yes’ sound is then used as voice identification to authorise payments or charges in the victim’s name.
Senior Constable Steve Smith of Mackay Police on Apr 26, 2017 wrote on their website, "If the scammer already has your mobile phone number and some sensitive identification information of yours… you may have some serious and legitimate reasons to be concerned!We’re now sharing this post statewide as we believe it to be hitting many areas."
Police advice how to combat the phone scam:
- Spread the word - Share this information
- If you receive a "can you hear me?" phone call - hang up - don't respond!
- If you did respond with a "yes," alert your financial institution, begin to monitor your accounts closely.
While the scam is more of a warning at the moment, some people across Australia have received these calls.
Perth resident Misha Keuhn told SBS Hindi, that she has received numerous 'can you hear me' calls over last month.
"I had a call every day for three weeks. When I blocked the numbers, the voice mails were: 'hello can you hear me!' I thought they were just dumb."
Ms Keuhn has not responded to those calls.
A fact-checking site on the Internet, Snopes.com argues this scam is unproven. The scam which has been widely reported un the United States and United Kingdom, is yet to cite an actual case of someone being scammed. The website concludes, "The “Can you hear me?” scam for now seems to be more a suggestion of a hypothetical crime scheme than a real one that is actually robbing victims of money."
For the time being, one can do what Misha did. "I have blocked all those numbers on my phone."
