I know how to forward my own Comcast VOIP phone number to some other number by picking up my handset and dialing * 72 followed by that number.
But there was a recent warning about a scam that involves being asked to dial * 72 while talking to an incoming call on your line -- a procedure I don't recall ever seeing mentioned anywhere.
Does this exist? What does it do? What are the consequences?
Some education for the innocent will be appreciated . . .
It's a mixed-up scam warning. Once they get a few years old, scam warnings and other passed-around "urgent" E-mails tend to mix up details. If you look around for old "Craig Shergold" messages (the poor little deathly ill kid who wanted to break the Guinness Book of World Records for number of post cards received, but didn't include an expiration date on the message, and he's no longer poor, little, deathly ill, or a kid), you'll find that they changed both the spelling of the name and the kinds of cards requested as the years went by.
Rest assured that once you're connected to someone, you can touch tone to your heart's content without affecting your phone line.
Scams these days mostly involve wiring money or giving out information that could be used for identity theft, so if you're smart enough not to do those, you'll dodge 99% of them.
John C. Fowler, snipped-for-privacy@yahoo.com
***** Moderator's Note *****ISTR a scam where con artists would convince their victims to activate call forwarding by using the "Three way-calling" feature, i.e., by flashing for a dial tone and entering *72 while the scammer was on hold. This might have been limited to Centrex customer, but details are hazy.
The objective, of course, was to have the victim's phone forwarded to a high-cost number, presumably one in another country, so that the con artist could make repeated calls to that number without charge. I'm tempted to say that Skype et al have obviated such a con, if it ever worked, but I don't know who would be the con man's customers.
This is a varient of "Clip on" fraud, and (at least in the case of Verizon) the HP AcceSS7 system would flag such usage fairly quickly.
Bill Horne Moderator
That should not work. First, you have to have a dial tone to make any feature code recognized by your local switch. The only way you can get a dial tone on an incoming call is if you have flash privledges, such as three-way calling. If you have call waiting, that is how you can cancel call waiting (*70) after an incoming call is in progress. But, *72 won't work on flash dial tone, at least not on the DMS-100 I am connected to.
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