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Comment by cmg | Hacker News Reader

I've gotten a few in the last couple months, with a US cellular number that I've had for over 20 years. At least two are "I missed you at the gym today!" via text and another was from a Vermont area code via WhatsApp to a "Dr. Jack":

> Hi Dr. Jack! My cat is very slow and does not eat cat food. Can you make an appointment for me?

> Sorry, you have the wrong number

> Sorry, I just checked, I entered a wrong number, please don't mind. hope I did not disturb you.

> Best of luck with your cat!

> thank you for understanding. You are a kind person. where do you come from.

And then I just moved on with my day, because as nice as that sounded I wasn't looking for a conversation.

The contact profile image is of a young, attractive Asian woman, I think at a restaurant. No reverse image results on Tineye or Google.

[Edit: I’ve had this number for over 20 years (not “nearly 20”) and now I feel old.]

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I also get messages on WhatsApp with similar profile pictures, although I’ve never replied or tried reverse image search. Some of the recent messages:

“Mike, this is my new number. Let's play golf tomorrow and talk about working together?” (My name isn’t Mike.)

“Hello, how's Kevin doing?” (My name isn’t Kevin and I doubt they're talking about anyone I know whose name is Kevin.)

The thing that always seems so weird to me is, if I’m on some list, why are there so few messages? Is this some group that keeps their list of numbers to themselves and is very disciplined with how often it sends out scam attempts?

Wow, I get the same messages about golfing with Kevin and Mike! (My name is also neither of those)

My spam horror show started after responding to a text similar to these. It was poised as a woman trying to connect with her daughter. I responded, and since then have had a deluge of spam and crap messages.

Oh wow. I got EXACTLY the same message, only with a sick dog and an asian woman in a car. I did the exact some response you did too. So weird.

A bit over a year ago, I received over SMS a photo of a young woman using her mouth to lift up her shirt and reveal her bra. Her face above the very bottom of her nose is not visible.

This was followed by the text "hi, is this Grèg frm Sañta Barbara?.? It is Jennifer."

Clearly some sort of scam is afoot, but I don't know what it is. And virtually no effort has been made to be at all convincing, given the diacritics.

Being less convincing saves the scammers time, because you won't reply unless you're easily fooled.

Multiple people I know rec'd this.

I got this one: “Doctor Mike? My little dog moves slowly and won't eat dog food. Can you make an appointment for me?”

The profile picture was the smiling face of an Asian girl. I didn’t bother to respond.

There's a lot of lonely people out there who probably would welcome a friendly conversation with a random stranger. I bet that's the target audience for this scam.

The pictures are always super blurry, clearly fabricated or heavily doctored. Often I've gotten the same portrait for several scam texts from different numbers.

To be fair, my wife says the same thing about the photos I take with my phone.

Finding the right place to focus the camera is essential, to both focus on the plane you are looking for as to have it focused on a spot that will produce the desired brightness in the overall picture (how that works I don't know, just advice from an ex that went to photography school for some time)

There is no person. You are just helping train an AI

idk, I've tried baiting these -- respond with "no problem, your appointment is booked!" They will thank you and proceed with the "so what are your hobbies" part.

Excellent idea. Annoyed I didn’t think of that one.

I got one today, addressing me by a wrong name and berating me for bullying some (female) name. Last line was something like "This is Jin."

It may have been a totally wrong number or the start of a scam. I decided not to engage and haven't heard back. Considering how mad they came across in the initial message, I can only assume silence means it was a scam.

I had almost the exact same exchange, with someone with a photo just like that! 747 area code, was it?

It was an 802 area code in this case, but I think it’s pretty clear now that these scammers have multiple personas and numbers to work with.

Does the profile picture have a sign in the background saying "Vilan Pho - Fresh Soup Everyday", perchance?

I got

"Hello are you Mr.Jack? My aunt recommended you to me,saying that the found the shop I wantend."

Burmese phone number.

I went back and reviewed my conversation. I hadn't looked at the photo super close before, and was surprised when I could actually get a somewhat high-res version of the profile photo.

I had a photo of an Asian lady holding a Starbucks cup at a restaurant. Maybe an office, actually? The photo was reversed, as the lettering on the cup was backwards.

Nope. It’s some kind of restaurant. She’s drinking a tea or juice or something like that from a glass with a straw

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