Romanian Intelligence Service warns of phone‑spoofing fraud

The Romanian Intelligence Service (SRI) has reported a wave of fraud attempts in which unknown callers use the technique of “spoofing” to display SRI’s official public‑relations phone number on the victim’s screen. During these calls the fraudsters may request personal data, banking information, passwords, authentication codes or even ask the victim to transfer money.

SRI stresses that it never asks for such information by telephone. It advises anyone who receives a suspicious call to end the conversation immediately, not provide any details, and then call back using the official number taken from a trusted source such as a printed document, the agency’s website or a personal address book. The spoofing method relies on software that can imitate any telephone number at the start of the call, but the caller cannot be impersonated once the victim redials the genuine number.

The agency’s guidance includes: 1) hang up as soon as a call seems doubtful; 2) do not share personal or financial data; 3) manually re‑dial the official number to verify the caller’s identity.