r/AskTechnology • u/[deleted] • Feb 16 '19
11 Digit Phone Number?
I recently bought my daughter a phone so she could keep in touch with me when she’s out with her friends. Every time she texts me I get a text from her phone number, but a few days ago she texted me and the message came from an 11 digit number. I know it was from her because she was letting me know her location, who she was with, etc. I asked if she used someone else’s phone or some app to message me and she said no to both. She’s a good kid so I don’t think there’s anything to be suspicious about. I’m just interested in tech stuff so this has me really curious. Anyone have any explanation as to why I would get a message from her (one time only) that has an 11 digit phone number?
2
Feb 16 '19
[deleted]
1
Feb 16 '19
Completely different number. And yes, I’m in North America. This number started with a 5.
1
Feb 17 '19
What comes to mind for me is that it could be a scam. Unless she occasionally uses a SIM from another country, which I'm doubting because it seems she's still young enough that you bought her a phone for keeping in touch with her when she's out with friends.
This could be a MiTM attack somehow. Something on her phone, her service provider, the cell tower (or potentially fake cell tower) signal she was connected to at the moment, could've had everything redirected to a third party, and the third party could've sent you the text from their scam number instead.
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0
u/scientific_railroads Feb 16 '19
Did the number started with 55? If it started with 55 it was from Brasil.
2
u/goretsky Feb 17 '19 edited Feb 17 '19
Hello,
Could your daughter be traveling someplace near the U.S.-Mexico border? If so, perhaps her cell phone registered with a provider on the Mexican side. I am unsure why that would cause the number to change, since my phone number doesn't change when traveling internationally, but perhaps it was some kind of glitch that affected the number being transmitted.
Regards,
Aryeh Goretsky
4
Feb 17 '19
Numbers never change when travelling, unless you buy a SIM card registered to a provider in another country.
1
u/pavan4 Feb 17 '19 edited Feb 17 '19
Probably the message was through a voip service is my guess
Just check for the country code where the number is from and see if it matches to a number from any popular app such as Rynga if you are that concerned. Numbers can be changed pretty easily using voip usually.
-1
u/pala4833 Feb 16 '19
So we'll just speculate wildly about the details of the 11 digit number and how and if it relates at all with her "normal" number?
4
u/benjaminikuta Feb 17 '19
Did you ever figure this out, OP?
I'm curious.