Have you ever received a call from an international number that you didn’t recognise? It could have been a ‘Wangiri’ call – a scam that could leave you hundreds, if not thousands of pounds down.
Falling victim to this scam, also known as the ‘One Ring’ scam, involves receiving an automated call from an international number that hangs up almost immediately. If you were to call back, you would be rerouted to a premium rate international number charged high fees for making a long-distance call, which would be partially paid to the scammer and added to your phone bill.
The phone calls are often received overnight and are repeated several times to try and make people think that there is some kind of emergency situation taking place so that they are more likely to ring back.
Phone networks are actively trying to stop Wangiri calls from reaching their customers, but thousands of spam calls still take place every day. Whilst some networks offer refunds to anyone that loses money to this scam, many do not; so in order to reduce the likelihood that you will become a victim, there are three steps that you should follow.
First, don’t answer calls from international numbers that you don’t recognise. Second, don’t call back missed calls from international numbers. Finally, if you think you have received Wangiri calls, or any other type of spam calls, text CALL to 7726 to alert your network. You can also use this number to forward any suspected spam text messages to.