What is Caller ID Spoofing and How Can it Hurt You

New Scam to Get Your Money

What is Caller ID Spoofing? - Caller ID spoofing allows a person to change the number on the recipients caller id to any number they choose. This number can appear to be your bank, your financial advisor, your best friend, your boss, or any other number the spoofer desires.

Caller ID spoofing was created so that businesses with multiple lines can have all the lines report out the same number regardless of the line being used. This is helpful when you call your cell phone company to get help with a phone problem. They will place you on hold and call you on another line to help with troubleshooting the problem. The number that appears on the other lines caller id will most likely be the main customer care line.

Caller id spoofing has been around since the 1990's. You have probably not heard of them until lately because it was only available to business' as explained above or PI and law enforcement agencies.

In the 2000's hackers started digging into the idea of caller id spoofing and what resulted from their curiosity and intelligence are the spoof sites you can find online today. The technology started out crudely with sending a signal during the first few seconds of the call to change the recipients caller id and evolved into businesses where anyone can purchase caller id spoofing for a time period and disguise their voice in the calls they place.

Over the next few years there were cases of this service being misused. This started to alert the US government and in 2007 "The Truth in Caller ID Act" bill was passed in the house. This law was to make it unlawful for anyone in the US to allow use of this service with the intent to defraud. This is good but there are caller id spoofing companies located outside of the US. When this was passed in the senate the wording was changed to read that it cannot be intentionally misleading or inaccurate.

Lately the states are getting involved and are passing bills to regulate or possibly prohibit caller id spoofing illegal. This is most likely due to the rise in public scams that have been out there.