My question? Why is it, if this is a call back number, that the number does not show on your bill as an incoming call only as an out going call?  I was able to get my carrier to credit the amount of these calls back to my account. Best advice, tell your family members not to call back any numbers they may not recognize.

DO NOT CALL OR PICK UP THE PHONE! I missed a call this morning at 6:27 am. It only wrung once and the number was 473-520-9775. Glad I did not call back. I got on Facebook later to find out that Utah is being hit right now. Here is the news article: http://m.ksl.com/index/story/sid/28211799#.UsUAlmQIW7w.facebook

If it expires before you can read it, it states:

Scammers calling from 473 area code, police warn
by Whitney Evans ? Jan 01 - 10:00pm

SALT LAKE CITY ? Calling back this unknown number may lead to unwanted cell phone charges.
Officials from the Utah Valley Dispatch Special Service District warn against picking up calls from 473-520-9734. The number is from a Grenada and apparently from a caller who claims to be in distress.

Those who call back are charged by the minute. Spanish Fork police and Utah Valley Dispatch reached out to their communities via Facebook and Twitter to warn people to not pick up the phone.

The scam doesn't appear to be new. News reports as far back as 2002 say answering or returning the call can lead to thousands of dollars in cellphone fees.

Do you get Charged if you have unlimited minutes?

On New Year's morning, I received a call on my Sprint cell phone from 473-520-9748, only I didn't answer because I was busy. It was 1:53 am. Later I saw the number on my missed calls, saw that it was from Granada, and stupidly (because I had had a few too many for NYE) redialed the number out of curiousity. I couldn't get through-- there was some recorded message about my cell phone provider not being able to complete the call. Then the same number called me back last night (Jan.1) at 11:15, rang once, and hung up, leaving no message. This time, I got online and found that the number is a scam, possibly from a one-ring porn site, and that the callers are hoping the person returns the call so they can bill a bunch of money to your account. The article said that the scammers use a woman in distress to hook the scammee. I called Sprint this morning, but they found no record of this number on my account. Sprint explained that the reason for this is because the scammers are calling from a tablet or something without an actual phone number, so it doesn't show up. My cell phone company checked, but so far no unwarranted charges are on my account, so I'm lucky. Sprint gave me information to block the number.

473 "AREA CODE" WARNING -- DO NOT RETURN DIAL ONE RING CALLS RECEIVED FROM AREA CODE 473 !!!!!!

In the current variant of this scam, the caller doesn't have any intention of talking to you. All the scammer wants is for you to get upset enough about the late night call that you return the call, never even noticing that it is from a foreign country outside the reach of US or Canadian laws. When you return the call (at international rates), there may also be a big surcharge added to your phone bill that gets passed along to the scammer.

What appears to have been the original version of the scam surfaced about 11 years ago in Japan and is known as the "Wangiri scam:"

From Japan Times
http://www.japantimes.co.jp/news/2002/08/21/n ... r/#.Ur2543-9KSN

From the Economist
http://www.economist.com/node/1367988

A few U.S. news organizations, but not many, have picked up on this latest variant:

KPVI, Pocatello, ID TV report on Grenada phone scam
http://youtu.be/eSp9tY1gBW8

From Toledo News Now
http://www.toledonewsnow.com/story/23695832/b ... huge-phone-bill

An older report from WCAX-TV in Burlington, VT describes the scam:
http://www.wcax.com/story/15581487/check-your ... area-code-scams

The biggest news organization to date that I have seen recently running a story on this scam is KSL-TV, Salt Lake City, Utah:
http://www.ksl.com/?sid=28211799&nid=148&titl ... _cid=featured-3

I don't think this problem is limited to or has anything to do with Verizon.  The same problem has been reported on other carriers, I believe, but Verizon Wireless appears to be the biggest carrier, so they get the most calls.  Verizon has a discussion board set up with at least one thread concerning "473" calls:

https://community.verizonwireless.com/message/1035009

It appears that at least Verizon is devoting some resources to stop these callers or at least refund some or all of the charges for people who call these numbers.  How long that will last is known only to Verizon, and even they may not have decided at this point.  Other carriers may also be doing the same.  They all want to avoid bad publicity that may drive away customers, of course.

At least one early report on 800notes.com, if taken at face value, asserted that a charge of $100.00 was made to a phone bill for calling back for 15 seconds.  Even regular calls to 473 numbers are billed at upwards of $1.80 per minute by most cell phone carriers, even on so-called "unlimited" phone plans, unless you have paid extra for an international dialing plan.  It may be that the scammers get a cut of this money for every international call they receive.

That's why either:
(1) you can't return the phone call, because even though you would otherwise be able to dial it like an ordinary long distance number, you phone company has a restriction on your placing international calls (which these are).  At least some pre-paid cell phone services work this way.  If this case applies to you, consider yourself lucky. Or,
(2) when you call back and get through, the operator of the 473 phone number tries to keep you on hold for as long as possible to run up your phone bill and their profits.

The scammers don't have to be associated with recent security breaches, such as the recent one at Target stores.  (In fact, many of the victims of this scam say that they either don't shop at Target or did not shop there during the period of the known security breach.)  All the scammers have to do is randomly dial a lot of telephone numbers in already-assigned area codes. And they must be dialing a LOT of them based on the complaints logged to 800notes.

It probably doesn't cost them anything to dial you, either, if the called party (you) doesn't pick up the call before they hang up. It only takes a small percentage of angry and/or curious people calling back for them to make a lot of money. They don't even have to pay for real people to operate a call center -- it's all done by machines, outside the reach of US and Canadian law enforcement.

So do yourself a favor and don't call these scammers back.  And you'll also be doing us all a favor, because they wouldn't call anyone at all if there weren't so many people who fell for this scam.

I called called at 5:58 this morning on my cell phone. Immediately looked it up on computer and read the posts. Tried calling just to see what would happen. Nothing happened, I was disconnected after 2 seconds and I tried twice. weird. Will ask my other users on network if they got same call.

Of course you'll be charged silly genius. Call your carrier when you get charged. Why wouldn't you get charged for an international number? You called it and you'll pay whatever the rates are.

You will be charged. You just called an international number genius.

http://www.ksl.com/?sid=28211799&nid=148&titl ... e&s_cid=queue-5

This is an article from ksl.com.   These 473 area codes are scammers.  For those of you who called the number back...I feel sorry for you.

JUST GOT THE HEADS UP  ON THIS PHONE NUMBER  FROM A CO-WORKER.  I TEXT EVERYONE IN MY FAMILY AND JUST BEFORE MY DAUGHTER RECEIVED MY TEXT ,  SHE GOT THE CALL  BUT DID NOT ANSWER IT.   PLEASE LET YOUR FAMILY AND FRIENDS KNOW ABOUT THIS  

Phone rang once...thought I missed a call.  Called the number back and it was porn on the other end.  Hung up immediately and blocked number.  Boyfriend received a call from same except the last digit was a 4.  

Got the call last night around 10pm and it was of a girl crying and saying help, and then it hangs up shortly after. Called back to get porn recording. My mom got it to at about the same time i did.

413-520-9775 called my cell phone last night 5:39 pm, I answered without looking and was disconnected so naturally I just hit redial without looking and was connected to a recording of some porn.  I called Verizon, it shows up as a US number, no international charges or other charges show up on my account.  Have blocked the number on my cell phone.

(473) 520-9775 This number called me and I did call it back a couple times so my husband could hear. It's a fake porn call!!! I don't appreciate however these people got my number!!! I have been told we would be charged for calling this number!!!! I hope there are no charges on my bill or I will switch companies!!!

This number called around 7:30 pm and also called every phone number that is connected to our cell phone account.  Called the phone company and they suggested to block the caller and not to call it back.

I got a call 3 times today. Unfortunately I called back thinking I had missed a business call. I better not be charged. I will raise hell!

No, it will never stop.  The Do Not Call list only works for those telemarketers who are in compliance with the law.  

Unfortunately, the DNC does NOT stop spammers and scammers from calling - who have no problem breaking the law anyway.

I thought when you signed up for "Do not call" calls, you weren't suppose to receive calls like this. There is always a scam or fraudulent things going on. Will it ever stop!?!

Received a call tonight from this number

Got a call from this number did not ring, call back and it was someone having sex. Hung up right away.

I got a call on 12/30  the phone rang twice and then hung up. Luckily I didn't anwser it.

Received call @ 410 pm today & before I could answer the call was dropped. I'm not in the habit of calling back strange #s but was curious about the area code thats how I stumbled upon this very helpful site. Thanks to each of your post I will be sure never to entertain this mess

Got this call a few minutes ago. It rang twice and hung up so I called back not knowing what I was getting into and I also heard the fake porn. Luckily I hung up almost immediately, hopefully I won't be charged much.

4:00 12/30/2013 - - - Same thing happened to me.

I got a miscall from this number 473-520-9775 at 3:05pm, Dec. 28, 2013. When I call back, I heard the sound of audio sex like anybody else. I hate that. This come from the damn country called Grenada.

This number called me 3 times today. To my disgust upon answering the phone there was some porn audio on the other end. I am calling the phone company to find out how they got my number and how to block them from calling again

I left my phone in another room and later noticed that this "Grenada" number had called me.  Glad I missed it!  I was about to call them back when I decided to see if I could find any info on the web.  Thanks everyone!

Indeed it is a sick scam and they are hoping you stay on the line and run up a huge phone bill that they will get a portion of.  The call was to the island nation of Grenada and will be costing you at least $4 /min if not more.  You need to contact your phone company and see if they will reverse the charges and also block calls to/from this and other 473 numbers.

Missed the call, so I dialed the number and sounded like someone in pain. I then checked this site and found out it was a scam.

Called them back .. Sex noises . Sounds like a sick scam...