What are the chances that someone is somehow using a clone of my cellphone number or account?

I've been occasionally been receiving calls for years now from people trying to reach a (porn!) video rental store. Yesterday, because the caller was particularly chatty, I discovered the caller had MY telephone number written down or printed (not certain which) and had not simply mis-dialled. We cross checked the number and it was mine for certain he had there. He steadfastly insisted he had used the very same number to order the videos in the first place (that he was now calling to complain about). In fact, he was so sure that he insisted I was a part of a ruse to stitch him up with bad DVDs!

I pay little (almost no) attention to the telephone bill, it's always at (or slightly above) the normal monthly contract rate and I merely pay it without scrutiny. I wouldn't notice the odd additional calls granted, but I can say with a fair degree of certainty that nobody is milking my cellphone account.

I plan to do some searching on the 'net to try and get some background information on what hacks/exploits are available on cellphones before I speak with my network provider (Orange).

If anyone here can confirm or deny whether any of this is even realistically possible (as opposed to being hypothetical nonsense) I'd be very grateful.

Are you sure it wasn't a mate of a mate winding you up?

I'd make the observation that if a porn rental 'store' was trying to rip you off with a clones SIM, then you'd certainly notice it. I'd also question why such a place would give a cloned number for incoming calls? Since Orange don't charge for incoming calls, it would make no sense. The only way that I could see that occurring as part of such a rip of is if the 'store' made an outgoing call to their customers mobile phone - and the number was then stored in the address book.

Either that, or your number is identical to one with a similar area code that *is* a porn shop and someone printed up a bad batch of cards at some point and hasn't realised.

Are you sure it wasn't a mate of a mate winding you up?

Valid point but I am completely certain it's not a wind-up.

I'd also question why such a place would give a cloned number for incoming calls?

I can't reasonably imagine why either. The only theory I can offer is these are illegal videos and traceability (or lack of) is important.

Either that, or your number is identical to one with a similar area code that *is* a porn shop and someone printed up a bad batch of cards at some point and hasn't realised.

That assumption, and the 'fun' element of...
me: "Oh, you mean the PORN videos?"
caller: "Er, yes"
... is the only reason I've not questioned this before.

What rattled my cage was the fact the caller had already (he claims) ordered/received DVDs via my number.

Something's wrong here I know. I can't figure out how, for example, how the seller made the original sale without me knowing about it.

I know for certain the seller is based in London and so are most (if not all) of his customers, I live in Oxford (about 30 miles away as the crow flies). I wonder if the cellphone provider's topography/geography could be a factor?

I wonder if the cellphone provider's topography/geography could be a factor?

In the US, I think it would be, yes. Dunno how it works in the UK.

For instance, imagine two cell phones with the same number, one based in the 530 area code, and one based in the neighboring 916 area code. The 916 number is owned by the video store.

Someone who lives in the 916 area code calls the video store without dialing the "916" area code, that's how they're supposed to do it. They do this for months, it works.

Then they decide they're tired of the awful service from their current cell provider and they buy a new phone at the mall which happens to be in the 530 area code. Or they move up the street and their land-line number changes to the 530 area code. Even if they understand this technically, they might not remember that they have to dial 916 to call the video store. So they get the schmoe in 530 instead.

On a related note (it seems to be stupid-Bitt-stories night) ....

A few years back, I had a pager issued to me by my employer. For the sake of this conversation, let's say that it's number was 800-987-6543. Shortly after I got it, I started getting pages two or three times a day that would just be ``485'' and nothing else. Odd.

One day, I got a page that was ``4859195551212''. Noticing that it looked like that standard ``485'' that I'd been getting, plus what looked like a real phone number, I decided to give that number a call. Someone answered and I said, ``I believe someone there paged me.''

To which he responded, ``Oh. You must be Panasonic support.''

``Uhhhh.... No. What number did you dial?''

``1-800-987-6543-485''

``What?''

``I was told to call 1-800-987-6543-485.''

``Are you sure they didn't tell you to call area code 987, 654-3485?''

``What?''

``The number they gave you -- it's not an 800 number -- it's a standard long-distance number. Didn't you notice that there were three additional digits?''

``What??''

The conversation went on like this for another five minutes or so before I just gave up.

I continued to get similar pages, not all from the same guy. I'd call and make fun of people when I could deduce a phone number from their otherwise incoherent pages.

I finally had to get a new pager.

I'm enjoying your stories, tonight, Bitt, those were two really good ones.

My wife's cell phone voicemail continues to get long messages from Loren. No one talking on the messages, just long recordings of the sounds of Loren's car interior as he drives from point A to point B.

I'll let Loren explain why...

My pocket has a tendency to call friends when I forget to lock the keypad on the phone.

Yeah, funny thing is that I don't clearly remember when Loren or I would have programmed her number into his cell phone. We've done one ski trip together where I might have used his cell phone to call my wife (though I don't remember doing that), and there may have been an empeg meet in the Bay area where I was carrying her cell phone with me (I do that sometimes when I'm on trips) and I gave him her number so he could get a hold of me. I just don't remember it.

Never know. I've gotten phone calls from people I could swear I didn't give my number to, it's an unlisted number, and the 5 or so people who know it, know not to (and won't) give it out - So I guess it must have been me. Not that I didn't want to talk to them, I just didn't expect the call.

My wife's cell phone voicemail continues to get long messages from Loren

I had similar problems with people who got new Nokia phones. Many of them would never lock their keypad, and all the Nokia phones they got had the keypad exposed at all times. And by default, they stored the first 7 or so numbers as quick dial numbers, where you just hold down the key to dial.

Lucially it has stopped, as many people have moved on to clam shell phones or similar arrangements where locking the keypad isn't needed. Though it was always entertaining to try and identify where the person was. Once my friends girlfriend did this with the phone in her purse at the grocery store. I got the call, and heard them talking about what soup to buy. So I hung up, called back, and offered my choice of soup when my friend answered. They were rather puzzled at first until I explained.

A quick search of the 'net reveals an article written in 1998 said that in order to completely clone a SIM you need physical access to the original. So, unless you've recently misplaced your phone and then had it miraculously reappear, I'd say it's somebody who has trouble reading. Then again, if they've been renting porn videos, maybe their eyesight isn't that good anymore.

I don't know wether two identical phones could also exist on the same network, otherwise, how would the network know which phone to 'ring' when someone dials your number.

In the days of analogue cloning, people only used the ID's to make calls, there would be no point resolving the phone number as no'one would want to incriminate themselves by answering a knowingly cloned phone.

In the days of analogue cloning, people only used the ID's to make calls, there would be no point resolving the phone number as no'one would want to incriminate themselves by answering a knowingly cloned phone.

Well, back in the days of analogue, ie about 8 years ago, Hugo found his phone had been cloned. It was odd. As I recall, you could call his number from his phone and get an irate Glaswegian! The network seemed happy enough to have two identical phone IDs active at the same time.

pca

What about ringing from another number? Did you always get the other bloke or was it pot luck?

Cloning a modern SIM card is relatively difficult, versus the old analog phones where it was trivial. Odds are, that's not your problem.

Instead, the most likely problem is the increasing density of assigned telephone numbers. My home phone differs from a bill collections agency in exactly one digit (in my phone number, it's a seven, in the collections agency, it's a one). Guess what? I regularly have messages on my machine screaming at me for forgiveness or whatnot about the money they owe. It's all quite entertaining, I suppose, but it does get old after a while. Back in the old days, they took a lot more care to have a larger Hamming distance between assigned phone numbers, but that just doesn't fly any more.

Another interesting data point: my old cel phone was in the 713 area code, same as my home phone. Both got a regular stream of wrong numbers. My new cel phone is in the 832 area code. I don't think I've gotten a wrong number there yet. I assume that the newer 832 area code is more sparsely assigned, and thus has fewer wrong numbers.

The moral of the story, assuming there is one, is that getting phone numbers in the ugly new area codes, while more annoying to remember, are better for avoiding wrong numbers.

"I assume that the newer 832 area code is more sparsely assigned, and thus has fewer wrong numbers."

It was my understanding that 832 numbers were for cell phones only, but I could be wrong about this. Though I know lots of people with 281 and 713 numbers, I only know one with an 832, and it's a cell.

As mentioned it is possible but very difficult to clone a GSM SIM (so I have read) but they would both be deactivated as soon as they were used at the same time.

I think that either the number has been misprinted in the past or it was allocated to the seller at some time.

Our phone number at work was used by a local turbine impeller manufacturer until 1996ish and we get a few calls a month from people dialing the number printed on old literature.

We know the correct number by heart now and people seem impressed!

Gareth

Mike's direct line at empeg used to be a central heating company. We have hours of fun talking people through dismantling their gas central heating units.

Rob

My old NTL number must have been recycled as I always used to get wrong numbers usually from old dears who wouldn't take no for an answer...

When I lived in London, the phone number was one digit different from that of the local bank. We used to get some pretty strange messages left. I'm not entirely sure how -- the answerphone message was pretty unambiguous that you'd reached the house of Roger, Pete and Andy .

Dunno how it works in the UK.

FYI: In the UK, cell phones (we call them 'mobiles' over here, though) aren't assigned to the normal area codes. Normal area codes begin with 01 or 02 (e.g. numbers in London are 020 xxxx yyyy, numbers in Cambridge are 01223 xxx yyy). Mobile phone numbers generally use an 07 code.

In reply to:

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We have hours of fun talking people through dismantling their gas central heating units.

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Correctly? Or did you take the more amusing/cruel route?

I wasn't entirely serious.

Darn - would have been a good one Not that I in any way condone that sort of thing. (Unless it's recorded for posterity!)

In college a friend of mine's phone was 1 digit off of the local pizza delivery place. At first, we tried pointing out that they HAD in fact, dialed an incorrect number, 1 week later, called the phone company and tried to get a new number. They said no. After that we felt we had done all we could do and started taking orders. After about a month, the pizzaria called and volunteered to help us change our number (and buy it from us). 2 days later, we got a new phone number.

Hmm you gotta use situations like that to your advantage..

"Large pie with pepperoni, that comes to $12.23 with tax. Your name?"
"Cathy"
"And the address?"
"123 Chastity Hall."
"Allright, Cathy, are you young, attractive, and single? We're having a half-off special running for young, attractive, single women."

Shoulda just upcharged it and actually had the thing delivered to us, the re-deliver it and make a fiver. It's not like campus was so incredibly huge.

OK so I finally have to take the bait.

Why do you guys called Pizza "pie"?? Pizza is so not pie!

Rob

Pizza is so not pie!

Sure it is. It's just made of cheese and meat instead of fruit and sugar.

(And besides, that's kind of regional anyway. I don't hear it called pie very often around here unless it's from a New Yorker.)

Uuh, ever have a Chicago deep dish? It's pie.

-Zeke

Pies have a lid. If there's no lid it's a tart.

Rob

Can you really argue that you shouldn't call a pizza a pie, when you call the top crust a lid?

Tsk tsk tsk... After all the UK-isms we let go here, you're busting our chops over pizza "pie"? Look at the shape! We all know that fruit "pies" AND pizza "pies" were named after pie charts.

Or at least that's what my manager tells me.

I'm with Rob on this one. The only way I can reconcile such usage in my mind, is to think of two completely different words, which just happen to be spelt and pronounced the same way. Because there's no way that a pizza is a proper pie.

Richard.

The only time I've ever heard a pizza referred to as a pie is by Italian caricatures, usually on cartoons, or by people referring, obliquely or not, to those caricatures. Certainly never in any serious context.

Allright, this is from Webster's collegiate dictionary...

Main Entry: pie
Function: noun
Etymology: Middle English
Date: 14th century
1 : a meat dish baked with biscuit or pastry crust -- compare POTPIE
2 : a dessert consisting of a filling (as of fruit or custard) in a pastry shell or topped with pastry or both

So the "or both" of meaning #2 refute's Rob's Communist notion that all pies must have lids.

Anyway I think this explanation gets at it... (from http://homecooking.about.com/library/weekly/aa073100a.htm)

"Pizza is actually modern Italian for pie. The origin of the term is murky but is said to be derived from an Old Italian word meaning "a point," which later evolved to the Italian word pizzicare, meaning "to pinch or pluck." A Neapolitan dialect of the word first shows up in print in 1000 A.D. in the form of picea or piza, assumably referring to the way the hot pie is plucked from the oven. Early forms of pizza were most likely what we call focaccia today, since the tomato didn't reach Italy until the 16th century, hence no tomato sauce for the pie we know as pizza. The addition of mozzarella cheese (initially made from buffalo milk) did not come about until the 19th century. The standard tomato, basil and mozzarella pizza is first credited to Raffaele Esposito of the Pizzeria di Pietro, who dedicated the creation to Queen Margherita in 1889. The colors nicely coincided with the colors of the Italian flag."

Amazing what Google can do for you.

Top half or bottom half?

Hugo

Besides... I don't think I could call anywhere and order a tart to be delivered to my home without giggling hysterically.

Pies have a lid. If there's no lid it's a tart.

Yeah. That's why we eat lemon meringue pie... uh, excuse me, lemon meringue tart.

And the last Pumpkin Tart I ate was delicious.

tanstaafl.

The OED's definition of tart does say that tarts have no lids and that distinguishes them from pies, but its definition for pie allows for both uncovered and covered pastries. So I'd say that either is a pie, but calling an uncovered one a tart is more precise.

I thought tarts were made with whole or sliced fruit, whereas pies were more creamy.

Whew! I was hoping someone would "bite" on the "half off" comment!

OK... here we go...

http://www.ivillage.com/food/ckschl/bake/qas/0,11749,165819_88733,00.html

According to the OED, both tarts and pies can be filled with fruits or meats (or other stuff, probably -- nuts and puddings come to mind). I didn't look up cobblers, though.

"An old cobbler" is also a slang term for a male geriatric. So I guess it depends on how desperate for cash the tart is.

These guys know about pie! Trust them

LOL. That brought a chuckle to my morning..

lemon meringue tart

In British English pie implies a top crust. The names of some traditional North American dishes, such as Pecan Pie, have been imported into the English language untranslated, much as Tarte Tatin still gets spelt with an 'e'. If pecans, pumpkins, or lemon meringues grew in the wild in Britain then those things would have been called tarts.

If a cobbler has a thick enough crust, of course, it becomes a crumble.

Peter

lemon meringue tart

On thinking about it a bit more, perhaps the meringue on a lemon meringue pie counts as a lid, rather like the potato on a shepherd's pie or cumberland pie.

Peter

Mmm.... me want pie.

I liked the old days when everyone was either British or French. You knew where you stood, and you sure knew what constituted a pie.

Rob

Yup...we bastard yankees must be the cause of everything wrong in the world...I suppose I'll just have to become a expatriate so I can be "cool".

You knew where you stood.

Usually in two lines, watching the other guys coming up the hill...

Usually in two lines, watching the other guys coming up the hill...

Yeah and probably wearing red so that you were nice and inconspicuous...

.I suppose I'll just have to become a expatriate so I can be "cool".

I can't decide if I want to be an expatriate Canadian so that I could long for the gun control back home or an expatriate Briton so that I could have a drier, more sarcastic sense of humour.

...because us expat Brit's aren't allowed to long for the gun controls back home...

Since we're already talking about SIM clones/security....

I am about to sell a Nokia 8290 on eBay. It doesn't have a SIM card installed. Is it safe to show a picture of the label under the battery? There are two barcoded strings. One starts with IMEI and the other one starts with Code:.

And if anyone would like to make an offer on it, I would be willing to part with it for not that much money. I do not have the charger or a SIM. It is meant for VoiceStream (TMobile) so it is GSM.

For selling a GSM phone, the #1 question any buyer might have is whether or not it's "locked" (i.e., it won't work with somebody else's SIM card). You can test this, easily enough, by finding a friend's GSM phone (preferably from a different network, i.e., trying a Cingular SIM card in a T-Mobile phone), doing a SIM card transplant, and seeing whether it works.

After doing some recent research, I understand that the IMEI number is also stored in the handset's flash and is, from the provider's perspective, your handset's unique identifier. It is broadcast to the network thereby giving them the potential ability to bar (amongst other things) that handset from their network.
AFAIK, over here, Orange is the only provider to use this facility to network lock (as opposed to handset lock) stolen handsets. This is something of a missed opportunity but perhaps the other providers turn a blind eye to handset theft in return for call revenue but that's another matter entirely!

To circumvent these locks and to disguise stolen handsets, people re-write the flash and IMEI number using a cheap dongle cable and PC software. So, coming back to your question about showing the label with the IMEI number, I think it's potentially a bad idea.

Edit: Clarified network lock