BY VICKI GILHULA
The Sudbury student who was billed $275 for long distance calls to an African island she did not make is not alone.
Northern Life received several phone calls from people with the same problem after an article headlined Sorry, wrong number, appeared in the April 30th edition.
Callers said they had ?mystery? long-distance charges to exotic locations on their phone bills after knowingly or unwittingly connecting to a site
called Datemaker or other adult entertainment Internet sites.
Det. Staff-Sgt. Barry Elliott of the OPP anti-rackets division, and co-ordinator of PhoneBusters in North Bay, says thousands of Canadians are
victims of this scam which can make inbound calls to your computer even when you are not home or asleep. (For this reason, it is advised to turn your computer off when it is not being used.)
PhoneBusters has received more than 300 calls this year about mystery calls that rack up charges on average of about $220 each, for a total of about
$77,000.
Ellen Roseman, in a May 1 article in The Toronto Star, explains some websites ?trick you into paying for free content by prompting you to download a special program to view it. Once downloaded to your computer, the program disconnects from the Internet and reconnects using an international long-distance number.?
While users may authorize some of the service, they do not authorize unlimited use, explained Elliott.
These sites can appear on your computer as ?pop-up ads.? Nicole Rioux of Sudbury, a Sympatico customer, says she immediately closed the window on the pop-up.
Or at least she thought she did.
Her phone bill contained long distance charges for phone calls to Sao Tome, an island in west Africa.
Telephone companies have not been understanding about these long distance calls and maintain the customer gave his or her consent to the website.
Article 9 of Bell Canada?s terms of services (on Page 31 of the telephone books) says, ?Customers are responsible for paying for all calls originating from, and charged calls accepted by, any party other than Bell for the use of Bell services, regardless of who made them or accepted them.?
Article 10, however, says customers can dispute charges while paying for the undisputed portion of the bill.
However, as the number of complaints to the media, PhoneBusters, the CRTC and Bell have increased in recent months, the phone company has reduced or removed charges.
Bell Canada?s security department has notified some customers about extra-large phone biills. Others find out when they see their monthly bill.
If you are a victim of mystery phone charges, you can phone 310-Bell to complain.
You can also phone the Canadian Radio-television and Telecommunications Commission (CRTC), the agency which regulates telephone companies, at 1-877-249-2782.
You can phone PhoneBusters toll free at 1-888-495-8501. Since there is a 15-minute wait, you can fax your phone bills to the agency toll free at 1-888-654-9426.
Elliot advises people to get anti-virus software.
As well, your phone company can put a block on incoming long-distance phone calls.
Elliott says he is surprised telephone companies have not been more aggressive in fighting these scam artists.
?Phone companies are dumping it on the consumer,? he said.
Roseman wrote in a follow-up article last week, ?We think that telephone companies and Internet providers need to come clean about this problem.?
If they don?t, the CRTC should force their hand, she added. ?Give us facts and figures about the disputed calls. Insert warnings in monthly bills.
Sponsor advertising campaigns. It?s not enough to post messages on a website.?
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