Mobile Phone Hacked ?

[Lance]

About 8.30 this morning I had an SMS from my daughter
Kathryn : What's happened, where are you, are you OK
Me : Yep, I'm great, why do you ask ?
K : I just got your SMS saying 'SOS', just that 'SOS'
M : That wasn't from me Kat, I haven't used my phone yet today, that's weird.
K : Yeah, weird. As long as you reckon everything's OK, I'm off to work, CYA
M : OK Lovely Lady, we'll ring you tonight.

End of episode 1

Rolling right along to 3pm this arvo, I get the same sort of call from Annee in a bit of a panic.
Again, I had not used my phone.

Common on emails and other coms I suppose, but I didn't think hacking was a big issue on Mobile, obviously it is.

[Dot]

slimy rat bags.

[native pepper]

Common on emails and other coms I suppose, but I didn't think hacking was a big issue on Mobile, obviously it is.

It's very common Lance, like you, don't use my phone very much, so turn off data if it's an android and they can't hack you at all. Both android and iPhones are very vulnerable to hacking, Win ph is a disaster and worse, according to the posts on some ph forums. I only do online stuff using my laptop and linux, never a problem that way.

[Lance]

Interesting point NP.
Stranger still is that I haven't had data access for ages since I don't really have a need for it.
I have no internet on it, just use it for calls and SMSs.

I initially thought it may have been someone who knew my number playing 'silly buggers' but both 'SOS' calls were registered at the other end as coming from my phone number. They don't appear on my phone as sent messages.

There have been no more as far as I know, just the two to wife and daughter.

[Barboots]

I doubt your phone was hacked.

It sounds like your number was spoofed as the sender, using an SMS gateway. These are available via the Internet. Furthermore, some earlier mobile handsets had the facility to change the sender's number... one of the Nokia 6xxx series if I recall.

This is how you get a text message from, say "Telstra"... even though the number is not saved as such in your phone book.

Cheers,
Steve

[GoinBush]

Our town has had no mobile coverage (Telstra) for two and a half days.

I was reading on an outage site that one girl (different town) call was calling her boss from her mobile and got through to someone at Veteran's Medicare or something random like that.

No help to you Lance sorry but if you do a search of outages and read the comments and the amount of websites down as well it's all a bit suss at the moment I reckon.

[Lance]

I doubt your phone was hacked.

It sounds like your number was spoofed as the sender, using an SMS gateway. These are available via the Internet. Furthermore, some earlier mobile handsets had the facility to change the sender's number... one of the Nokia 6xxx series if I recall.

This is how you get a text message from, say "Telstra"... even though the number is not saved as such in your phone book.

Cheers,
Steve

That could be it Steve.
Mine'as a Samsung S1, probably about 6-7yr old.

[Lance]

Update...........Mystery appears to be solved.

I have 'ICE:Emergency Contact' on my phone and both Anne & Kathryn are call recipients if ICE is activated. 'SOS' is the default message sent by the app.
I looks as though I must've done that unintentionally...

Thanks all for your thoughts

[dream4red]

Glad that you solved the problem Lance. Now you know how to stress out the family next time they ignore you!!!
Probably not a good idea to try again, unless really in trouble. But aint you glad to know that the app actually works?

[Lance]

Yeah Deb, Annee got a bit of a chuckle when I told her, but she did suggest not making a use of it toooo often.
I think I might alter the default message from 'SOS' to something a little more gentle and descriptive as well......