They started the voice mail off by saying my social security #! If my credit didnt suck so bad id actually care but they are obviously hacking peoples phones and computers to get this information and if you actually believe a motha f**** named joseph clark who sounds like mogli from the original jungle book you prolly should pay the loan haha

Calls your cell phone and says its a legal matter.  Blocked calls on all numbers including work.  Calls stoped for a long while. They keep switching location last time they were from North Carolina now Tennessee.  FBI is currently looking at this phone numbers so please post when they call you.

No such Law firm in Tenn

Your money is gone.  The scammer has it.  You will never get it back.  Consider it an expensive lesson.

Now the scammer has your name, address, and phone number.  He will sell that information to other scammers.  You will get more calls and e-mails and snail mails with more scams.  Don't fall for them.

Did you give the scammer your banking or credit card information?  If so, close the account and open a new one.  Otherwise the scammer will steal all the money in your bank account.

I GOT A CALL AND SENT 200 DOLLARS I WANT MY MONEY BACK

DON'T ANSWER

He's calling again now already!

I just got another call from him 10 minutes ago! didn't answer. I just reported him to the ftc.

I got a call from them about a half hour ago. I told him he had the wrong number and hung up. He called right back and I let it go to voicemail. These calls are nothing but a bunch of BS all foriegn speaking people threathing me. I just keep hanging up or don't answer. But I don't like the fact that they have so much personal information, what can be done about this???

LOL - I got "BRIAN Jones." Supposed to call him back tonight with a visa card number so he can deduct $492 bucks. Yeah, right. And he got frustrated with me on the first call! He kept saying "oh my God." Idiot! Who can we report him to?

Same thing, "Steven Jones" keeps calling my cell phone from the "state bureau of investigation" cause he's too stupid to know that this country has a Federal Bureau of Investigation. lol he told me that i would lose my job if i didn't call him back, he never gets to the part about the money because i always start a fight with him before that happens. Usually i tell him to shut up and listen to me and he tells me thats no way to speak to law enforcement, but will never tell me which law enforcement and always hangs up when i say its a scam and that my local Police Department is Listening to the call.

ditto that. They don't stop.  I won't either.  I will report every call they make .  Same scenario, different number every time claim to be from state bureau of investigation.....same song and dance.  There is a pool of callers in their operation.

This man with a foreign accent calls my cell number constantly, stating he is from the State Bureau of Investigations and that it is an important legal matter.  The scary thing is, that office knows my social security number when he left a voice mail he said it in the voice mail.  He also said he knows where I live and my bank account number.  Please stop this harassing phone calls.  I put them on "reject" on my phone, but they still leave messages.  Please arrest these *X&SU&F& .  They are stalkers.

They are calling again!  And what scares me I got a new cell phone# because of harrassment like this in the past.  Heavy thick Indian accent from a person who identifies himself with a American sounding name, Kevin Smith, Jimmy Carter (that one made me laugh); Kenneth Smith, Officer Brown, all kinds of names none which are legit.  Now they are also calling my job and harrassing the secretary - it is so upsetting and absurd.  A scam - and a scary one!  Beware!!!

this number called me and said it was a legal matter and I need to give them financial information

This is illegal and they should be tracked down and arrested

READ THIS:  You can beat this guy do not let him intimidate you he is a FRAUD.  This is called a breech of information which most likely came from a payday loan application which was either a fake application or your information was sold to this idiot through one of the companies you applied through.  Don't ignore his call answer it and talk firm and stern to him and tell him that you have filed a case against him and that you have notified your local law enforcement and that all your calls are being tracked.  He will eventually become frustrated and start cursing at you and eventually hang up and the calls will stop.  Like many others I had fallen on hard times and needed some quick money but never thought this would happen.  Don't give in and DO NOT SEND HIM MONEY.  Save the threatening voice mails he leaves for your evidence if you ever need them for future reference.  Contact the 3 major credit agencies and notify them of the SCAM.  You cannot be put in jail for debt and under the fair debt collection practices no one can threaten you or use profane language towards you to try to collect a debt on your behalf.  Fight this guy and take him down you can win.

this idiot calls 3x a day with a different name every time,,,  told me hes from the fbi, and i owe money, if i dont pay they are going to arrest me,, lol, i never knew you got put in jail for a debt, when i told him that he starts yelling at me telling me he will personaly come to my work and take me to jail, so i said back is that a first class airplane ticket, he said what do you mean, so i replyed your from another countey most of you scammer idiots are. he hung up real fast, lol,, what losers.

yes exact just like this other people have said he call me like 5 times now one last one he said you will loose your legal job  , he also said I know who you are and  were you live , I will give you till monday  .
So I call him back after a few hours in said como on down send me legal papers and we wil see .

this number has called me 20 times in a row.i told them to stop there stalker material.

http://abcnews.go.com/Blotter/phantom-debt-co ... 28#.UBlYp6NwWPk
Hundreds of thousands of cash-strapped Americans have been targeted by abusive debt collectors operating out of overseas call centers suspected of links to organized crime in India, law enforcement officials told ABC News.

The calls are part of a massive scam, one that appears to target struggling Americans -- especially those who have gone online to apply for payday loans. Armed with personal information from those pilfered applications, the threatening callers, who claim to be debt collectors poised to initiate legal action, have managed to pry loose millions of dollars from their victims -- even when the victims never owed money in the first place.

"This is what we call a phantom debt collection scam," said Jon Leibowitz, the chairman of the Federal Trade Commission. "It's a very pernicious and innovative new fraud."  Working through call centers in India, the commission estimates that the criminals have dialed at least 2.5 million calls, persuading already cash-strapped victims to send them more than $5 million. Some have reported receiving dozens of calls per hour. They are victims like Cindy Gervais, of New Orleans, who went online for a quick loan when her husband's car was hit by a driver who didn't have insurance.

Even though she paid the loan off, the so-called "phantom" debt collectors with Indian accents began calling to say she still owed money.
PHOTO: Brian Ross of ABC News interviews Kirit Patel, who faces a civil suit for allegedly running call centers in India from which callers harass American consumers and demand immediate payments of nonexistent debt.
ABC News
Brian Ross of ABC News interviews Kirit... View Full Size
Indian Debt Collectors Target US Victims Watch Video
Fake Debt Collectors Harass Americans Watch Video
Debt Collectors Gone Wild: Racist, Offensive Calls Watch Video

"He more or less told me that if I didn't pay, they were going to have someone on my doorstep to arrest me," she told ABC News. "And that they were going to contact my place of business, and tell them what kind of person I am. At first, she said she resisted. Then the calls became more frequent, and started to ring on her cell phone, and at the grocery distribution company where she had worked for 27 years.

"I was more or less was in panic mode because he told me there would be someone before noon at my place of business to arrest me and take me to jail," she said tearfully. "So I agreed to pay him."

After receiving scores of complaints, investigators with the FTC said they began tracking the calls, and following the payments. They alleged the payments led them to a California company run by an Indian-American named Kirit Patel, and that such scams would not be possible without American front men.

"I would say that all roads of this scam, or many of the roads of this scam, lead back to Mr. Patel," said the FTC's Leibowitz.

ABC News tracked Patel for weeks, from the suburbs of San Francisco to Austin, Texas.

Patel refused to talk. But his lawyer, Mark Ellis, said he believes it is far too early to pass judgment on his client. Ellis, a Sacramento-based attorney, told ABC News that Patel was hired for a nominal fee to set up an American shell company, and had no idea what the call centers in India were doing.

"I can tell you, he was as snookered by the people in India as anybody," Ellis said. "He's a 69-year-old man who is nearing his retirement who thought all he had to do was set up some corporations and everything was on the up and up. He's completely dismayed that he has become the lightning rod of this entire problem."

A close friend of Patel's also defended him in a brief interview at his home, saying Patel was not trying to defraud anyone -- he was just an unwitting, bit player in a larger scheme.  "If Mr. Patel was just a cog in the wheel he seems to have been a pretty big cog," Leibowitz said. "It is clear that Patel was integrally involved with this scam."

Leibowitz points to thousands of pages of financial and phone records gathered by the FTC and filed as part of a civil case brought against him in the U.S. District Court in Sacramento last month. When FTC lawyers sought to freeze his assets and prevent his business from continuing to operate, Patel responded by invoking his rights against self-incrimination. His lawyer told ABC News he has had to be careful in how he responds to the allegations in civil court "because there is a potential criminal action," but that Patel maintains the allegations against him are false.

Federal investigators said the phantom debt collection operation that allegedly benefitted from Patel's assistance was one of several that all trace back to the same small town in Western India called Ahmedabad. Callers use technology to make it appear that the calls originate inside the U.S. Victims provided ABC News with recordings of dozens of the calls, and many of the thickly accented callers appear to be reading off a script.

"Subpoenas have been readied, and Monday morning you're going to be picked up from your home," one caller says on a victim's voicemail. "And you have children. Don't worry about your children. We have a childcare department to take care of the children."
Indian Debt Collectors Target US Victims Watch Video
Fake Debt Collectors Harass Americans Watch Video
Debt Collectors Gone Wild: Racist, Offensive Calls Watch Video

"You will be behind bars for six months," said another caller. "And once you go behind bars, you will lose your job. Once you are behind the bars, you won't get a single drop of water."

William Peerce Howard, a Tampa attorney who represents victims of harassment from debt collectors, said it takes an especially twisted criminal to use threats and coercion to pry money from someone who is already struggling financially

"These guys really are the most visible villains in America today," he said. "They make a living scaring people."

Follow ABCNewsBlotter on Facebook

Mark Merola, of Florida, said he just panicked when the caller told him he might be arrested at the deli where he works in a Florida retirement community.

"I was nervous. I didn't want to embarrass myself, my family," he said. He used his debit card to pay the collector $576.

Afterwards, he says he realized "how stupid I was."

"It just happened so fast," he said. "I got scared."

Leibowitz said he hopes with more attention, future potential targets of the scam will recognize red flags before they turn over any money.

If callers say they are from the police, consumers should know that law enforcement officers do not collect debt for private parties. If the caller is speaking with a thick Indian accent, but calls themselves by a names such as Officer Mike Johnson, that should be a tip off. And if they're calling 40 times in two hours, that's another red flag. "Legitimate debt collectors, legitimate pay day lenders don't do those sorts of things," he said.

Merola said he would like to see anyone involved in the scam prosecuted aggressively.

"There's no place in society for these people," he said.

For tips on how to avoid being scammed by a phantom debt collector, CLICK HERE to go to the Federal Trade Commission's website

Got a call on personal cell and work number.
Said something regarding an internet loan?
Threatened with law suit and loss of job.
Very foreign like accent!!
Definitely a scam. I told them I was recording the call and turning into WV Attorney General.

I recently got a call from this number to my cell phone. I have a feeling they have tried to called under a different number before and I told them if they continued to call I would file charges of harrassment against them as I had already been in contact with my local sherriff office about the calls. They say I owe them money that I know that I dont owe. This time all they got was my voice mail but they have called my work before as well. I already notified where I work that it is a scam and I have contacted my bank and local law enforcement.

This is a scam to collect a debt that they people owe to several umbrella companies they say they are a law firm that will take you to court have you put in jail if you do not pay pay all their fees do not believe their lies call you're bank credit info do what you have to do do not fall for this scam they say you have committed fraud they speak with a heavy accent and have several phone numbers from all over the country ranging from TN MA Washington DC