Spam Voice Calls

  • Periodically, members of the Dartmouth community receive phone calls at their Dartmouth phone number that are considered "spam".
  • These calls are just like the spam calls you get on your personal phones and email and can take the following forms:
    • The caller will either leave a voice message or will begin speaking in a foreign language.
    • The caller might try to sell you something, sometimes impersonating a Dartmouth vendor.
    • The caller might threaten legal action.
    • The call might appear to originate from a Dartmouth phone number. Just remember that all legitimate Dartmouth calls will only show the extension. A spoofed Dartmouth call will show a 603-646-XXXX number.
  • These types of spam calls have been affecting several higher-ed institutions recently. Since the originating numbers are constantly changing, we cannot block these calls system-wide.
  • We recommend that you just disregard these calls. If they are personally threatening, contact Dartmouth's Safety and Security.
  • You do have the ability to block numbers from calling your Dartmouth number. See https://services.dartmouth.edu/TDClient/1806/Portal/KB/ArticleDet?ID=130584 for additional information. 
  • Additionally, you can enable "call screening" for your phone. When you do this, when someone calls you from a number that is outside of the Dartmouth phone system, they will hear a message telling them that call screening in enabled and they need to "press 1" to complete the call to your phone. If they don't, the call is automatically disconnected. This should help with any robo calls you're getting as there isn't a physical person to press the number. Someone calling from a 646 number won't hear this and have to press 1. See https://support.zoom.com/hc/en/article?id=zm_kb&sysparm_article=KB0069338 for information on enabling this setting.
  • In the event we decide to block a number across the Dartmouth College phone system, when that number next calls a Dartmouth number, they will hear a recording telling them they have been identified as a spam caller and to stop calling. We will only do this when we receive a request from Safety & Security, the Office of the General Counsel, or Senior Leadership. 
  • Related to this topic, see area codes that have been blocked in order to help reduce scam calls.
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