It is common for collection agencies or advertising companies to call by stealth and their employees to become very persistent and annoying. There are of course also the phenomena of hoaxes by stealth or harassment for personal reasons.

Read what you can do when you are being harassed by calling you from hiding:

-Request your mobile phone company that you subscribe to not to receive calls with hidden numbers. So when someone calls you with a hidden number, it will show them that your number is busy.

-Request your provider to neutralise the caller's masking for a limited period of time in order to detect nuisance or malicious calls (Government Gazette B 1853 - 21.12.2006). In this case, when someone calls you with a masked number, they will hear a recorded message informing them that their masking has been neutralised. This way you can find out which number is calling you with masking and then identify the person making the nuisance calls and proceed to report the nuisance.

-Prosecutorial, investigative and pre-trial authorities have the right to request from communication service providers the electronic traces of a criminal act via the internet, as well as the chronology and details of the person to whom the electronic trace corresponds.

-From other communication service providers, the Authorities are entitled to request the "external data" of the communication, i.e. the call number, the caller - called party details and the time of the call, with the provider being obliged to hand them over without the need for prior authorisation from the Communications Privacy Authority (CSA).

Tips to avoid annoying phone calls 

1- Do not answer a stranger who annoys you or threatens you on the phone and do not answer aggressively. What he seeks to pursue is your strong reaction.

2- You can leave the handset on . In most cases, the annoying prankster will be discouraged and hang up.

3- Use an answering machine and let the message be recorded. You can also record a message on the answering machine that all calls are recorded to a special police service or a private security service.

4- During the night to avoid being disturbed, turn down the ringer or unplug the phone.

5- Never answer personal questions (name, address, etc.) asked by strangers, even if they introduce themselves as sales representatives, employees of the bank you work with, etc.

6- If the disturbances continue, use caller ID (as long as you are not being called by stealth) and also inform the telephone company you have a contract with and the police so that they can tell you what action you can take.

7- When young children or seniors are at home, it is advisable to activate call forwarding so that they do not give out information about you and your family.

8- Be particularly wary of people who introduce themselves as technicians from your mobile phone company and ask you, to supposedly check your device, to press the key with the pound sign (#), the numbers 90 or 09, the pound sign (#) and then another number.

9- Turn off your phone immediately, because if you follow these instructions, a stranger may gain access to your SIM card and make calls by charging your account.