Received a weird sms...

[duk3]

Has anyone else received an sms that reads as follows:

"MTN is conducting routine maintenance on our network. Your services shouldn?t (sic) be impacted, but if they are kindly turn your phone on and off to restore services."

The number it's from doesn't look familiar (in fact it's way too many digits for a regular MTN cell number ), and I have no idea what they're talking about. I got it today. I get similar messages (from similar numbers) claiming to be from FNB, but this message doesn't state that it's from FNB. Just some rubbish spam?

 

[Ancalagon]

Who is your service provider? Do you bank with ABSA?

Just be careful of that ABSA/MTN banking fraud thing.

 

[koeksGHT]

sim swop scam

 

[Beachless]

sounds like a sim swop scam I sugest you contact your bank and cellular provider just to be safe.

 

[duk3]

I don't bank with ABSA. I'm with FNB. MTN is my cellular provider.

Okay, panicking a little here. Any numbers or info you could recommend for me, please?

 

[Ancalagon]

One option is to contact FNB and change the number that your banking SMSes go to.

But I havent heard of FNB customers being affected, so you should be safe. However, never hurts to be careful.

 

[sgs]

My mom received this today as well. I told her to change her internet banking password pronto.

She's also FNB with MTN prepaid.

My guess? MTN is doing some maintenance on their prepaid infrastructure (But no bank is immune from sim swop fraud, so I won't put it past the fraudsters.)

 

[ajax]

Post the number its from. Or look on smscode.co. za

 

[duk3]

This is weird. It might be a coincidence, but I have read up a bit about sim swop scams, and they talk about people getting numerous calls from numbers. This happened to me recently. I didn't answer (which the experts tell you not to do), but they also warn you to not switch off you phone, which I did. This was about a week ago.

I also got a letter telling me about my bank account being moved to another branch, because the existing one closed down or something. Other people in my family got the same letter.

Guess I'll have to get down to my local branch and check things out. I don't think it would be a good idea to do anything through my online banking profile for now, for sure.

The number reads: +278393002660005. Checked the number on the website and it said it could not be found. I'm right in substituting 083 for +2783?

I had another sms come through from +2783930035309833 asking me to reply yes to have monthly statements emailed to me for free. Looking at the date though that might have been last year.

Update:

I scanned my pc for malware, logged in to my account online, changed my details and my associated number for OTPs -- to a number on a different network as well.

Update 2:

I filed a report with MTN for possible sim fraud. Awaiting a reply. Thinking of phoning FNB's fraud line next.

Update 3: FNB says it isn't their problem. Phoned MTN prepaid customer service line, and read out the sms and gave him the number. He says it's legitimate, so I'm satisfied. It was nothing after all, and I probably was due to change my passes anyway.

 

[VirtualForce]

Oh ok. Thanks for the update, and yes, time to change passwords.

 

[Ancalagon]

Glad it was nothing, never hurts to be careful.

 

[VirtualForce]

Just our of curiosity, if a sim swop was done by a criminal and you switch your phone off and back back on, will the phone (sim) still have service? In other words, can two sims with the same number exist on a network?

 

[Redeemed]

But I havent heard of FNB customers being affected, so you should be safe. However, never hurts to be careful.

All banks that use cellphone authentication have been affected.

 

[Ancalagon]

All banks that use cellphone authentication have been affected.

The news reports have almost all been about ABSA customers.

 

[duk3]

Just our of curiosity, if a sim swop was done by a criminal and you switch your phone off and back back on, will the phone (sim) still have service? In other words, can two sims with the same number exist on a network?

From what I've read, in this case no. You would lose signal/service, and would not be able to receive calls, smses, etc. That's the point behind the scam. So they get all the notifications from the bank, and you don't, so you're really in the dark about what's going on, and it would probably be too late before you realised.

 

[10i]

Every SIM card has a SIM number and an MSISDN (cell phone number, eg. 083 123 1234) associated with it.

When a SIM swop is done, the MSISDN is activated on a different SIM. If you have dual call or twin SIM, then you have a second SIM, with the first SIM set to divert to the MSISDN (cell phone number) of the second SIM. Then when someone phones your number, if the first phone is off the second one rings.

It should not be possible to have the same MSISDN activate on more than 1 SIM at a time.

(I have also seen when a SIM swop goes through that the old SIM looses signal, the new one only works after the SIM swop is processed).