Messages about selling used underwear????

[JanglyBeads]

So, my friend is a rather worried! Last week she had a text saying something like:
“Ava, have you signed up for the London Exchange yet? William”.
She replied saying I think you’ve got the wrong number. Then a missed call from a number she didn’t know, then a call she decided to answer, it was a William asking the same thing, she said she thought he must have wrong number.
Thought nothing more of it until Sunday morning when she looked at her phone and there were loads of messages, some involving those names (Ava, William, London exchange) again, all asking whether the panties were still for sale! All from different numbers.
So it doesn’t seem to be as simple as someone’s given out the wrong number, because why then would “William" keep trying to contact her after she’s told him twice it’s not her.
We presume there’s not a lot the Police could do.
Has anyone ever had similar?
What should she do? Obviously, she won’t be answering any calls from unknown numbers in future.
Thanks

Doing this on my phone, hope I haven't enabled voting! And yup I know there's no "Unreasonable". Well not on my friend's part anyway

Is he using the correct name for your friend?

If it was a 1 off I would say block and ignore, but as there are several numbers my best guess is that somone has put her number on a site. Either in error or as som ekind of prank/revenege - could she ask "William" where he got the number?

No not my friend's name

Why wouldn’t she just block and ignore?

Or even better, get in on the exchange and make some cash!

What do you think the police would do? Nothing illegal is happening here.

As it's the wrong name I think that's my probably my Prank/Revenge idea out the window - i reckon "Ava" really is trying to sell old knickers and has accidently put down your friends number

You could try googling the phone number and see if it brings up any hits - try it in quotes with the usual spaces to try to get more results -as in "07700 123 456" as well as just 07700123456 - "Ava" will probably be wondering why she's getting no business and will be more than happy to change it!

Thanks @JauntyJinty

I'd just block and ignore.

She'd need to block all unknown numbers....

No she wouldn’t. She just blocks the ones that message her, it’s really simple.

Tell your friend to stop responding to messages from unknown callers/ texters. They are all scammers.

Stop being nice, helpful women telling people they've got the wrong number FFS.

It is monumentally ridiculous in this day and age to not immediately block.

Why would she respond. Ffs.

'William' is contacting her from a call centre in India or the Phillipines or Thailand.

He is not a real person doing business on his own. He is very likely held in peonage or slavery and required to make 8000 contacts a day.

What kind of a bubble do you all live in that you have so little idea of how scams work?

How would this work as a scam?

🤦‍♀️

So sorry I don't have your superior levels of savvy @YellowTreeHouse.

Educate us, please?

Bit confused about the set up and who called when etc but sounds like someone’s put her number on an online site?

One woman who used to date my friend got really angry after their break up and put his phone number on a gay hook up site. He had constant messages and calls about hooking up until one man took the time out to explain to my friend that he got his number from a certain website. Ex then confessed.

Maybe it could be something similar where someone has put your friends phone number on a site that offers to sell used underwear? I might be reaching but it’s the first thing that came to my mind

Well yes we'd thought that but how to stop the calls etc is the question.

It's caused her quite a lot of stress and embarrassment. She knows the latter isn't logical but nonetheless it's real.

She should definitely Google her own number to see if it's been put on a publicly available website - if it does look like a legitimate error on a quasi-legitimate site then she might be able to get it removed but obviously she'd need to be careful given that it's in iffy territory.

I’d have to change my number. If there’s constant calls/messages then you can’t block them all. It sounds as if the damage is already done so realistically what else could she do?

I also agree with googling her number to see what comes up

I've tried googling and didn't find anything at all.

In which case I'd say their only option would be to reply to, or call the number of one of the texts they have received and ask where they got the number from and then go to the source of the number and ask them to take it down.

By replying and engaging with them she’s confirmed it’s an active phone number and it’s probably been then put on a list of numbers for scammers to call. Just block and delete anything like this from now on, don’t reply to any of them.

Oh and sign up to the TPS telephone preference service or I think there is one for mobiles now. Not that actual spammers pay any attention to this but stops some cold calls etc.