DoT advises users not to dial *401# followed by unknown mobile number

economictimes.indiatimes.com:

Department of Telecommunications (DoT) has advised telecom subscribers not to dial *401# followed by an unknown mobile number as it could lead to cyber fraud.

A statement from DoT said citizens should beware of callers who ask them to dial *401# followed by an unknown mobile number. «This activates unconditional call forwarding received on the mobile of citizens to the unknown mobile number.

This allows fraudsters to receive all incoming calls and can be used for fraud,» the DoT said in an advisory Thursday.

The government has been stepping up its efforts to check growing incidents of online financial fraud.

Scamsters usually call subscribers and pretend to be a customer service representative or technical support staff from their respective telecom operator. The fraudster states that either there is a problem with the subscriber's SIM card or there is some issue related to network or service quality, and that they need to dial a specific code to fix the problem, which usually starts with *401#, followed by a mobile number.