Gullible Forwarders Own Mobile Phones Too

from the they're-everywhere! dept

What is it about a slightly different medium that makes people lose all sense of reason? For years, one of the most popular urban legends/hoaxes is that Bill Gates, AOL or Disney will give you prizes or money for forwarding on an email. It seems that some random person thought it would be funny to start a similar hoax via text messaging... and it worked. Vodafone is apparently now spending some time trying to track down the hoaxer who sent out text messages promising free air time on Vodafone to anyone who forwarded the message to 13 other users. However, where the guy got stupid was that he included a (non-emergency) police phone number to call for anyone who didn't get the credit. The police, as you might imagine, are pissed off at all of the phone calls they received, which could open the hoaxer up to criminal charges for interfering with the police.
Hide this

Thank you for reading this Techdirt post. With so many things competing for everyone’s attention these days, we really appreciate you giving us your time. We work hard every day to put quality content out there for our community.

Techdirt is one of the few remaining truly independent media outlets. We do not have a giant corporation behind us, and we rely heavily on our community to support us, in an age when advertisers are increasingly uninterested in sponsoring small, independent sites — especially a site like ours that is unwilling to pull punches in its reporting and analysis.

While other websites have resorted to paywalls, registration requirements, and increasingly annoying/intrusive advertising, we have always kept Techdirt open and available to anyone. But in order to continue doing so, we need your support. We offer a variety of ways for our readers to support us, from direct donations to special subscriptions and cool merchandise — and every little bit helps. Thank you.

–The Techdirt Team


Reader Comments

Subscribe: RSS

View by: Time | Thread


  1. identicon
    dohhhhhhh, 7 Nov 2005 @ 2:46am

    Included a police number to call?

    Really? That is pretty funny.

    link to this | view in thread ]

  2. identicon
    SV, 7 Nov 2005 @ 4:05am

    No Subject Given

    In my country the mobile operators actually gave 20 cars to people who sent SMS at a specified promo number (lottery). So don't be amazed someone believes this. It makes more sense than e-mails - since after all Vodaphone profits from the messages.

    Of course if you're smart you'd not buy into this at all, never mind if hoax or not.

    link to this | view in thread ]

  3. identicon
    Andrew Strasser, 7 Nov 2005 @ 4:54am

    Something for nothing.

    Like comedy really. Text messaging is inside network.

    link to this | view in thread ]

  4. identicon
    Dam, 7 Nov 2005 @ 5:27am

    We can Only Hope

    We can only hope that these people don't vote.

    link to this | view in thread ]

  5. identicon
    Teleflip, 7 Nov 2005 @ 7:22am

    Stupid cell phone trick of the day

    Stupid cell phone trick of the day:
    With teleflip.com - A service that lets you send email to yourphonenumber@teleflip.com and have it delivered to the phone, regardless of carrier... anyone can send [costly?] email messages to anyone they want to send to, with whatever advertisement they want include - the sender doesn't need to know the recipient's carrier, he only needs a cell phone number.

    Now I wonder how many people are going to test this, using their own telephone number... ie; 2125551212@teleflip.com

    link to this | view in thread ]


Follow Techdirt
Essential Reading
Techdirt Deals
Report this ad  |  Hide Techdirt ads
Techdirt Insider Discord

The latest chatter on the Techdirt Insider Discord channel...

Loading...
Recent Stories

This site, like most other sites on the web, uses cookies. For more information, see our privacy policy. Got it
Close

Email This

This feature is only available to registered users. Register or sign in to use it.