Watch Out for “Wrong Number” Texts

If you get a text out of the blue from a number you don’t have asking for sensitive information, you probably know to delete the message and move on. But if the text says something like, “How are you?” or, “Are we still on for tonight?”, you might assume the person knows who you are, and you simply don’t have their number saved. Don’t buy it.

While there are times where this does happen, and someone we personally know texts us without us having their number saved, it’s more often than not a scam. That’s because bad actors know it’s confusing to receive a vague yet casual message at random, and hope you’ll respond asking for more information. The goal is to get you talking, so they can try to eventually get just enough information out of you to break into accounts.

That information might include usernames and passwords, but it likely will be things that can come out more naturally within conversation—including names, ages, where you live, where you work, previous employment, etc. This information can be used to a variety of reasons, but by building a profile of you, bad actors can attempt to do anything from access accounts to steal your identity.

It might be tempting to respond even knowing this, since you know you won’t hand over sensitive information to a number you don’t know. Still, it isn’t worth engaging. Bad actors also benefit when you respond to these texts, since they can confirm your number is active. Once they know they have a person behind the number, they can try to target you in other ways. There are plenty of methods to discover whether your number is active, so don’t worry if you have ever responded to a text like this. Just know it’s usually worth blocking the number from the get-go if you know it’s spam.