These past days I have been receiving calls from Service NSW asking questions about my business to further my application about the 2021 COVID-19 Business Grant NSW but they keep calling from a private number which I don't get if they are really from Service NSW.
They have a bunch of relevant information and was wondering if it is legit?
Alternatively, ask them to give you a number that you can call them back on and check that number before calling back.
Yup. And ask for a reference number.
Calls from Service NSW generally come from a private number fyi
Yeah i dont know why all the calls from genuine places come with private number??
Reason #1
Unfortunately, fraudsters and scammers know that people rely upon caller line identification WAY too much. It's easy to spoof a number and have it report as whatever might have the person answering the call feels comfortable with. It's a simple and effective way to improve a social engineering attack vector.
Reason #2
Depending on the organisation's VOIP infrastructure, an employee:
• that is working remotely may not be running through their usual (office-based) gateway, ie CLI may simply not be available/configured
• may be using a mobile device (maybe a BYOD handset/number) to make the call to ensure a quality of the call connection
Reason #3
Collections departments (eg of banks and utilities), government departments etc are more likely to encounter call avoidance.
Edit: This is not an exhaustive list, of course.
Telcos refuse to patch spoofing as it costs money and private numbers are a large money maker.
I waste "taxpayer" money by asking a lot if questions on private numbers and often get hang ups because "government agents" don't get any information. They live to confirm my identity. Yes, I know how to follow up.
But still, how can I tell telco who's harassing me? I'd vote for any political party that will outlaw private calls and penalise telcos for spoofing.
Telcos refuse to patch spoofing as it costs money
The patching approach was ratified in 2018 and it's already taken the US telcos almost three years to implement. I can't possibly fathom how much it would have cost them in development, coding, testing, stakeholder consultation and change management. But someone has to pay for it.
I wonder if AU network operators were forced, by regulation, to implement a solution here (as opposed to the current CAL industry guidance, how much more consumers would be willing to pay? What is accurate (non-spoof-able) caller identification worth? $1/month? $5/month? $10/month?
and private numbers are a large money maker.
I can't comment on that. It certainly used to be in the era of packet-switched calls. But I don't know if it's true today.
I waste "taxpayer" money by asking a lot if questions on private numbers and often get hang ups because "government agents" don't get any information.
I'm guilty of this, too. Especially when I'm working from home and can let the scam call run for 15-20mins on speakerphone while I do other things.
Likely legit, most govt services will use private numbers for outbound calls.
That depends on what they're asking. You can get a good idea by the types of questions they're asking and whether the answers/information can be used for scam purposes.
Private numbers are not abnormal from a government department. They don't want people calling back.
Again, it depends on what information they have and what other information they might be trying to get from you.
Alternatively, ask them to give you a number that you can call them back on and check that number before calling back.