ALKHOBAR, 23 November 2004 — A recurring scam is causing concern in the Kingdom due to the proliferation of e-mail messages about telephone fraud. Called the “809 Scam” it involves telephone calls made to locations in the Caribbean. E-mail messages circulating in the Kingdom claim that people can unknowingly call international numbers beginning with 809 and that such calls could result in thousands of dollars in charges.

The truth is slightly different. In the US some telephone carriers have made “pay per call” agreements with other telephone carriers to charge more per minute for calls to certain telephone numbers in the Caribbean. In Saudi Arabia this is not the case.

According to Saudi Telecom, if a person calls a telephone number in the Caribbean that individual will be billed at the same rate as calling any US telephone number. STC has never made any “pay per call” agreements involving any Caribbean telecoms. An STC spokesman said the company is aware of the 809 Scam and would never participate in such activity.

The 809 Scam now involves many area codes other than 809. They include:

264 Anguilla, 268 Antigua & Barbuda, 242 Bahamas, 246 Barbados, 441 Bermuda, (Atlantic), 284 British Virgin Islands, 345 Cayman Islands, 767 Dominica, 809 Dominican Republic, 473 Grenada & Carriacou, 876 Jamaica, 664 Montserrat, 787 Puerto Rico, 869 St. Kitts & Nevis, 758 St. Lucia, 784 St. Vincent & the Grenadines, 868 Trinidad & Tobago, 649 Turks & Caicos Islands and 340 US Virgin Islands.

The scam gets started by an e-mail or SMS, which gives instructions to call a specified telephone number urgently. The message might say that a relative is ill or has been arrested or that an expensive prize has been won. Another trick is for one of these criminal operations to leave a missed call on the mobile. The first line of defense against fraud is to check the number. If it reads “001” followed by any of the area codes mentioned above, don’t call back unless you actually know someone in the Caribbean. STC also advises that a similar scam is going on involving numbers beginning with 905.

While adults may be wary of calling such numbers, teenagers are often very vulnerable and can be misled into participating in the fraud. Once the call is placed, extreme attempts are made to keep the caller on the line. The people working for these criminal operations also try to use any reason to obtain a credit card number. Of course giving out the number will lead to enormous charges appearing on the next credit card bill.

Neither STC nor any other telephone company will refund charges for international calls to these criminals since the fact is that the calls were made. STC cannot block the area codes as that would involve blocking calls to entire nations and only a tiny percentage of telephone numbers in those nations are actually being operated by criminals. Parents should discuss the scam with their teenagers and ensure that they understand the importance of not dialing the numbers even for a minute. Once the scammers know a responsive telephone number they often bombard it with repeated messages and missed calls in an attempt to get the caller to dial again.

“Most of these telephone numbers are for some type of chat line, contest or other questionable operation,” the STC spokesman said. “These operations and the companies that run them are not credible. We advise people not to respond to attempts trying to convince them to make calls to such numbers. If in doubt, call 900 from a fixed line and ask the operator where the telephone number in question is located and what rates would apply in making the call. Unfortunately, we expect that the problem of telephone fraud will only get worse. People must be vigilant.”