Phone Scam Starts With a Simple Question, Police Say

MARIETTA, GA -- Police in Marietta are spreading the word about a telephone scam that is triggered by your response to a simple question: “Can you hear me?”

The police force took to Facebook recently to alert residents that scammers can get vital information from you if you answer someone who says this: “Hi! This is Josh from the customer service department. Can you hear me OK?”

It's true that most of us would answer in the affirmative, saying "Yes, I hear you OK," or simply "Yes." If they get you to verbally agree, that's how they get you, police said.

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"These calls are recording your response and then signing you up to have monthly fees charged to your credit card for purchases on products you didn’t order," Marietta police said in a Facebook.

"Later the scammer calls back demanding payment and shows you proof that you agreed to the purchase by replaying his sales pitch and then your voice saying 'Yes' to agree to a charge for goods or services."

While the scam has been reported in several states, the hoax-decoding website Snopes.com says that the warnings may be unfounded. This is what Snopes says in a story on the scams last week:

Primarily, we haven't yet been able to identify any scenario under which a scammer could authorize charges in another person's name simply by possessing a voice recording of that person saying "yes," without also already possessing a good deal of personal and account information for that person, and without being able to reproduce any other form of verbal response from that person.

To be safe, residents are urged to hang up if they get a "robo-call" from a caller that doesn't clearly identify themselves first. It is possible to have your name added to a do-not-call list so as not to receive such calls, but, increasingly, no method is fool-proof.

In any event, never give out personal information, such as credit card or your Social Security numbers, over the phone, police said, citing alerts from the Federal Trade Commission.

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