I received a scam telephone call last night that appears to be targeting craigslist accounts. Scenario follows:

Scammer represents himself to be from the national do-not-call registry, in this case he said his name was James and he spoke with an Indian accent.

Scammer gives his call-back number as 888-225-5322 which happens to be the real FCC. He claims his extension is FCC087.

Scammer claims he is confirming your registration with the N-D-N-C database and verifies your name, address and telephone number. (Something easily found in the public telephone records.) When asked, he says there is no charge for this service.

Scammer then tells you that when you hang up with him you will receive a call from the Craigslist server with a code number. When you receive the code number and hang up with the craigslist robot he calls you back and wants the secret code the robot just gave you. (At this point I refused to give him the secret code since the robot just told me not to share it with anyone.)

Scammer then claims he must charge you a $149 "non-compliance fee" but at this point I couldn't contain my mirth and laughed him off the phone with a final reply in the spirit of our illustrious California governor. "F__k You".

I have reported the incident to Verizon, FCC and FTC.

Scam appears to be directed at obtaining Craigslist accounts. I suspect they are creating fraudulent accounts and using this method to obtain validation of the account by suckering people into being recipients for the validation callback call. I do not know if the called party's actual identity is being used in the craigslist account information.

Whoah! This is just bizarre as hell. A non-compliance fee? Strange world indeed.

Didn’t realize you were listed in the Adult section of Craig’s List.