How to check any mobile phone. Completely legal

What does the law say about this?

On January 1, 2014, the Federal Law of November 2, 2013 No. 304-FZ “On Amendments to Article 44 of the Federal Law “On Communications” and the Code of the Russian Federation on Administrative Offenses” came into force.

The law prohibited the street sale of SIM cards. Now the operator or a person who acts on his behalf (dealer) is required to enter into an agreement for the sale of the card and enter the subscriber’s passport data into it.

The dealer must send a signed copy of the agreement to the operator within 10 days. And the operator will check the accuracy of the information.

What operators know about subscribers

The contract must include basic information: full name, registration address, series and number of the passport, as well as when and by whom the document was issued. But if the SIM card was purchased secondhand from the metro or at a train station, then, of course, the subscriber data will be fake. You yourself understand how prohibitions work.

In addition, operators have data on calls made and SMS sent. They don’t record calls (for now - keep in mind the “Yarovaya package”), but they save the contents of SMS. They also have information about the dates and amounts of balance replenishments, the current account balance, and the IMEI of the device.

Is location tracked? Yes, and not only when you call. Coordinates are recorded at the moment of entering and leaving the network, moving between cells. Technically, the operator has the ability to manually request coordinates and record the entire track.

So how to break through a mobile phone?

Can't they call you? Check your phone settings!

The first place to look for the reason is the phone settings. Often users themselves get tricky with the settings. The reasons why they may not reach you are the following:

you have added a number to the blacklist;
there is a ban on incoming calls;
There is a restriction of calls for subscribers not included in the phone book.

Check your Call Barring settings

Go to the “Phone” application and go to settings, they are usually located in the upper right corner of the screen; these are icons with a gear or “hamburger” (three vertical dots. You need to check how the markers are set in the “Call barring” item. Then check the numbers on the black list. It is likely that in it you will find the number of the one who tells you: “I can’t get through.”

Check your Call Barring settings

Check your Forwarding settings

Another point to check is redirection. If forwarding is enabled, you need to configure it correctly. It is better to enable redirection:

if you are out of network access;
if you are talking to another party;
Always.

If they complain to you: “I can’t get through, the answering machine is working.” Change your settings or turn off forwarding completely. To ensure you don't miss a call while you're talking to someone else, turn on Call Waiting. In this case, when the second line is triggered, you will hear short beeps.

The caller constantly hears a busy signal.

Turn off mobile internet and synchronization

If you have checked the forwarding settings and everything is fine there, but the caller always hears a busy signal, turn off mobile Internet and synchronization. This usually occurs in areas where operators use old equipment and there is no LTE connection. Usually the person trying to get through then says: “I can’t reach you, it’s always busy. But as soon as you leave the unfortunate area, the calls go fine.

Ask

Incredible, but it works. Call the number, say that you are conducting a survey, ask a few simple questions. At the end, specify your first and last name.

If a person is ready to cooperate and has already answered the questions, he can automatically give his last name or first name. Especially if you promise a small bonus. For example, top up your account for participating in a survey. And even transfer these 10-20 rubles (the amount should not be large so as not to arouse suspicion).

Why MGTS home phone does not work - reasons

Among the main factors against which malfunctions occur are:

Faulty device. You can identify the cause in question yourself. It is enough to try connecting another device to the line. If the installed telephone does not function, you should purchase a new one. The repair service does not provide phone repair services.
Debt. If the balance is negative, the provision of communication services is suspended until the debt is repaid. Please note that in this case you will need to pay for connecting the number.
Closure. Damage can occur both inside the apartment or house itself and outside it. The wire strands must not touch each other. All uninsulated areas must be covered with insulating tape.
Line break. In rare cases, a wire break occurs. This is due to serious mechanical damage. In this case, it will not be possible to fix the problem without the help of specialists.

To Google

The easiest and completely legal way to find out a lot about the owner of a mobile number. People often leave this information in the public domain.

Forums, bulletin boards, social networks... If a person has “lit up” a number on the Internet at least once, there is a high probability of finding this message, using it to go to his profile, etc.

If the nickname is relatively rare or you find out something else, you can Google further. Combinations “nickname + city”, “nickname + surname”, “nickname + car make”, etc. will give additional information.

Finally, if you found a photo of a person by number, it makes sense to use the FindFace service. It finds profiles of people on VKontakte based on photos and provides links to them:

It often happens that they call from an unfamiliar number and hang up. Calls to such a number may be charged. Victims often post numbers on the Internet, so Googling the number before calling is useful.

How to understand that a number is blocked

The answering machine response can be a sign of several cases. The number may be unavailable or you may be blacklisted on this subscriber’s phone. There are very few opportunities to know for sure what happened - whether you were blocked or not. If you use another number, you will have the opportunity to check this.

Also, if the number does not answer for several days in a row, this will also indicate that the phone has been blocked. If you hear short beeps on the handset, no matter how many times you dial the number, this also means that the number may be on the black list.

Try activating the SMS delivery notification function on your phone. This setting can be found in the messages section. When you next send messages, a delivery report will be sent to your phone. Try sending an SMS to this number. If there is no response, do the same after a while. The absence of reports will indicate that you could be blocked. There is also a possibility that the phone is turned off and has not been used for a long time.

Both reports and calls may not arrive on the subscriber’s phone in several cases at once - his phone is turned off from receiving calls and messages, the number is blocked, the phone is offline or turned off.

Check social networks

Enter the number in the social network search. It can show accounts that are linked to this number, as well as posts in which it is mentioned.

On Facebook, just a phone number is enough. In addition, you can go to the form for restoring access to the page and enter the number. The social network will offer to send a six-digit code to this number, and next to it will show the account (photo and full name) to which it is linked:

VKontakte allows you to enter a phone number to restore access to the page, but requires the last name to which the number is associated.

Numbers with letters instead of numbers

Usually they replace zero and one with letters whose spelling is similar to the image of these numbers. And in this case it’s definitely not worth answering.

And who does this? - Of course, scammers. What for? - Of course, to take your money.

Imitating the short number from which messages from the bank usually come is a very successful scheme to defraud naive citizens. Therefore, always pay attention to how familiar the numbers on the phone display look. After all, “o” is much rounder than zero, and the Latin “I” does not have an upper tail, characteristic of one.

Login to Viber

The messenger allows you to find out the first name (and most often, the last name) and receive a photo of the user. Click the Add button (blue with a plus in the lower right corner), then enter the phone number and add the user. After this, in the contact list you need to click on it and select “Information”.

The photo, of course, can continue to be used in the same FindFace.

What does a person hear if his number is blocked?

Different types of beeps in the handset are designed to determine what is wrong with the subscriber's phone. When dialing a number and making a call, we hear the usual long monophonic sounds. When the phone is turned off or is not within the cellular network, you can hear the robot respond with a certain speech. If your number is blacklisted on another phone and you try to call it, you are more likely to hear that the number is currently unable to answer.

This is exactly the answer that sounds both in the standard application on the phone and in those that are installed separately.

An offline subscriber can be heard from different mobile operators. Some applications allow you to customize the answer and choose how your smartphone will reject unwanted calls from the blacklist. If you use the operator lock function, a technical support representative will help you find out.

Or the website of the operator from whom you purchase services. Technical information about services and network operation can be found in the “Help”, “Support”, “Questions and Answers” section.

Top up his account

When replenishing an account using a phone number, employees of mobile phone stores usually see the full name of its owner. Pretend that you want to check whether the number was entered correctly and ask the employee to give the owner’s full name.

Usually sellers meet halfway, suspecting nothing. Indeed, you want to top up someone’s account, which means you give the impression of an honest person.

And if the manager refuses to give your full name, you can go to another salon. Trying is not torture.

Again: you are not breaking anything. You just have to ask)))

Use special services

New sites where you can get a mobile number appear regularly. But should we believe them?

For example, here is one of the first in search engine results - phonenumber.to. Reliability – depending on your luck.

I checked several of my friends' numbers with their permission, and some of them confirmed the accuracy of the information. True, there is frankly little data: registration address and e-mail, sometimes also a photo. If the number has recently been changed, the service displays the old data.

There is also a lot of garbage in the service area. Look, for example, at the results of the latest queries that the service openly displays on the main page.

The site owner claims that he uses various software technologies to ensure that the collected information is as accurate and comprehensive as possible. Data is obtained from open sources (the same search results), APIs of other sites, from people who collect and sell mobile databases. Users themselves add information, not about themselves, of course.

UPD: after publishing the article, we were contacted by a user whose number was shown on the main page of the resource. The user claims that the number and unflattering description were added to the database in retaliation by an employee of the company with which he refused to work.

Conclusions: 1. This can happen to anyone. 2. You yourself understand the level of trust in phonenumber.to and the like.

Similar services are provided by the website nomer.me. Here they promise to punch not only the number and provide “full name, registration/registration address, date of birth, passport details of the owner, tariff, balance, date of opening (connection) of the number, history of the owners of the phone number, as well as who was the owner of the phone number in a given period time or get a complete list of former owners" (the author's spelling has been preserved).

The developers claim that the information is obtained from employees of cellular companies, and not from offline databases, so the relevance is higher. They can name other telephone numbers that belong to the owner of the specified number.

They will let you read SMS and provide call details. They also check your credit history, etc.

Prices:

Naturally, full prepayment is required for everything, which is already alarming.

Technically, nothing is impossible. Operators actually store subscriber data. The only question is whether OPSOS employees with the required level of access will expose themselves for the sake of a few hundred rubles.

Each employee signs a non-disclosure agreement (NDA). Violation is fraught with dismissal and the initiation of a criminal case.

But reviews about the service are rather negative. “Scam” is the mildest definition of deceived clients. They say they promise a lot, they take money, but there is no result. You can't get into the consumer rights society with something like that.

Actually, checking such services is easy. Order the information about your own phone number, and you will immediately understand everything.

Experts spoke about the threats of push-button phones

One of the users of the TJournal portal told a story about

how unknown attackers registered an account on Telegram using his grandmother’s SIM card installed in a push-button mobile phone.

According to the author, he received a notification about the registration of a new user from among his contacts in the messenger, and it turned out to be an 80-year-old pensioner who could not do it on her own.

“At first it seemed that someone at the operator level was intercepting SMS messages from pensioners, knowing in advance that they do not use the Internet. The idea is rich - the owners of granny phones do not know what the Internet is. Just intercept SMS and register telegram accounts and other social networks. And then use them as bots for various propaganda,” writes the user [punctuation and spelling of the author are observed - approx. ed.].

Subsequently, he managed to return the account and protect it using two-factor identification. As it turned out, the push-button “granny phone,” which in theory should only make calls and send SMS messages, had access to the Internet using the GPRS standard, which was taken advantage of by the attackers, who “hijacked” the number to create an account in Telegram.

According to Nikolaos Chrysaidos, head of threat research and protection for mobile devices at Avast, the attackers acted as follows.

“Someone most likely changed the SMS center number to another one that Beeline had.” The SMS center number is responsible for processing SMS transactions on the wireless network. When an SMS message is sent from a mobile phone, it first arrives at the SMS center, and then this center forwards the message to the recipient. The main task of SMSC is to route SMS messages and regulate the process. If this number is changed, the SMS that the phone receives can be redirected to another location: this will allow third parties to view and control them. The firmware of this batch of old phones was probably hacked and changed somewhere in production or by one of the intermediaries,” the expert believes.

Can push-button phones, which are often bought for elderly relatives, really pose a danger?

It is generally accepted that there are no threats for an ordinary push-button cell phone that does not have one of the popular modern operating systems installed, but this is not the case, Viktor Chebyshev, a mobile threat researcher at Kaspersky Lab, told Gazeta.Ru.

“The fact is that such devices still have an operating system, albeit a somewhat primitive one. It is worth considering that this operating system may contain code that an attacker can use to gain remote access to the device and data on it. This may be a feature provided by the manufacturer or a vulnerability of the operating system. Be that as it may, attackers have the opportunity to intercept control of such a device,” Chebyshev said.

According to the expert, unauthorized access to a cellular push-button phone is dangerous because the phone number whose SIM card is in such a device can be used to register accounts for social networks and any other services. Attackers need this to send spam and phishing. In this way, the base of infected devices may also expand.

Since the mailing allegedly comes from the victim’s number, there is a high probability that the number will be localized, and questions will arise for this person.

Attackers can also gain access to various services tied to a phone number.

“Despite the absence of most functions in push-button phones, their operating system has the ability to control GPS, GPRS and Edge modules. This is a simple mobile OS that does not have security features. If such devices are compromised at the manufacturer or retailer level, the phones turn into part of a botnet network, making it possible to register anonymous messengers and other services on them that require mobile phone verification. It is also possible to transmit simple text information from the device. This is especially risky when connecting to a phone number where such a device is used for mobile banking,” said Evgeny Sukhanov, director of the information security department at Oberon.

The protection strategy is simple - choose a tariff without mobile Internet, use only SMS and voice calls, says Sukhanov. There are no Wi-Fi modules in such devices - the device will not be able to access the Internet, even if the firmware from the factory contains malware, which means the phone number will not be compromised.

“In this situation, the most effective way to protect yourself and your loved ones, for example, the older generation or children, from fraud when using a push-button telephone is to disable services on a specific number, for example, the Internet, entertainment services, subscriptions. If possible, leave only calls and SMS,” recommends Kaspersky Lab expert Chebyshev.

Avast's Nikolaos Chrysaidos also says you shouldn't buy phones from lesser-known brands.

“Choose well-known brands, even if you buy old mobile phones with buttons. Check with your mobile operator that you do have a real SMS center number. If you have a very old SIM card, replace it with a new one from your operator. Old SMS centers that are decommissioned can remain a relay for new ones and can be captured,” the expert concluded.

Contact the operator

If you or your loved ones are threatened, you can contact your mobile operator directly and state the reasons for your request in a statement. Employees must review it and provide or not provide you with information about the subscriber.

But, of course, this doesn’t work if you just need to find out information about the person you’re hiring, want to buy something from, or go on a date with. Practice shows that operators usually refuse and require an official request to be made through law enforcement agencies.

What issues can experts help with?

The purpose of the Center is to coordinate and develop measures to ensure safe road traffic. In this regard, citizens can make proposals to improve the operation of the road transport network, organize parking space, and optimize traffic patterns.

Contact the Data Center to solve the following problems:

Report a broken traffic light, a broken road sign or other traffic equipment;
If you find any contradictions between signs and markings;
Making proposals for modeling urban traffic flows;
Find out the payment system for a specific parking lot;
Changing passenger transport routes;
Transmit traffic data, data on parking lots and other temporary parking areas.

Go to the police, prosecutor's office, FSB, FSO

The procedure is similar: write a statement to the authorities and state the reasons. If law enforcement officers consider the reason sufficient and open a case of a criminal or administrative offense (Clause 4 of Article 13 of the Federal Law “On Police”), they will make a request to the cellular operator.

The company will be required to provide subscriber information. Information about who owns the number does not fall under Art. 63 Federal Law “On Communications”, so the request does not violate the confidentiality of communications. The reason, of course, must be serious for the prosecutor to authorize the request.

But even if you are threatened, the process of providing data may take a long time. And it’s not a fact that the data received will be revealed directly to you.

Hire a private detective

And they provide such services. For a couple of hundred dollars they promise your full name and address, for a thousand or more - a complete dossier: download from the operator’s database, current location, call details. They most often refer to connections with authorities and the operator.

Of course, there is no guarantee. You wouldn’t report a private detective, much less a police or FSB officer. But the larger the amount, the higher the likelihood that the OPSOS employee will give out such information.

Representatives of law enforcement agencies, judging by information on forums and on the darknet, are also doing the same. Of course, this is an abuse of power and a matter within the jurisdiction. But most often the method works.

A universal way to get rid of unwanted calls

And now about one universal method to get rid of unwanted calls, which is suitable for smartphone owners. There are many programs that can detect calls from scammers and advertisers and warn the owner about unwanted incoming calls. More modern smartphones have a similar built-in feature. It is also possible to completely block such calls.

Unfortunately, such a program cannot be installed on a push-button telephone. Some mobile operators offer similar paid services, but reviews of their effectiveness are mixed. And in any case, it will not be superfluous to remember the simple rules listed above.

I invite you to participate in the discussion. Also, your ratings under this publication are very important to me. They will give me the opportunity to choose future topics that are interesting to the majority of readers.

Be healthy and take care of yourself! Thank you for your attention!

So there are plenty of options

In fact, the only question is whether the game is worth the candle. And without a phone number you can find enough information about many people.

We have listed the legal methods. Try it and see - it's free and safe.

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61 votes, overall rating: 4.39 out of 5)