My number is showing up on someone's caller id

[comet335]

I just had a visit from my local police. They had a complaint that my ooma number shows up daily and multiple times on someone in my towns caller id...I do not know this person. I live alone. I never use the ooma line to make calls. The officer knows me and knows that would not be making these calls. What is going on?

[lbmofo]

Scammers can spoof any number they choose. Ooma can't do anything about it. Even the big boys like Verizon & AT&T can't do anything about that.

[Argyles]

Rather simple solution for you, that is if you don't mind inviting the officer in to view your my.ooma.com call log.
Bring up the page, let him see the outbound calls don't match the victims phone number.

[oomamaniacal]

It is a federal crime to spoof caller id information for the purpose of defrauding or causing harm, under the 2009 Truth in Caller ID Act. If your reputation has been harmed in any way, you should call the FCC at 1-888-CALL-FCC.

The FCC requires that a telemarketer provide a telephone number that you can call during regular business hours to ask to no longer be called, and fines may be assessed for violators.

Hopefully the police provided the victim with the FCC number.

See:
http://www.fcc.gov/guides/caller-id-and-spoofing

[murphy]

The problem with this is there is nothing in the caller ID information to identify who the "spoofer" is.

Phone companies, Ooma included, need to block incoming caller ID data and only display what they look up in their own caller ID database. They need to validate all entries in their caller ID database so that spoofing is not possible.

Unfortunately the caller ID database operators charge a fee to add an entry to their database. There is no incentive for them to verify the data they have been sent.

I had an unrelenting blast of the V number caller IDs yesterday. They had a 9 digit phone number. Ooma accepts the 9 digit number into the caller ID blocking system but does not match against the 9 digit number and lets the call through. Ooma should block all malformed phone numbers or at least match against malformed numbers when they are in my reject list. I finally turned "Do Not Disturb" on to get some peace and quiet.

[comet335]

Thanks to all for your replies. I will print my call logs for the police. FCC has been contacted too.