Forum Discussion

box90's avatar
box90
SMARTY Pioneer
12-01-2023

Got someone else active number with new sim and PAC code, Privacy breach?

Hi

I recently switch to smarty and used a pac code to transfer my number. It took a couple of days but when it completed, I got a text saying your transfers complete but address to a different name, yet on my smarty profile it was the correct number. I then suddenly had voicemails, missed calls, text to pick up parcels, bank notifications not related to me. So I called a friend and to my surprise I came up as a different number for them. I was a bit shocked that this would be possible. To me it seemed like the equivalent of logging into your email account and you end up in someone else's. No idea if someone temporarily got my number. I quickly contact smarty and they told me to order a new sim and my number would temporarily be suspended, and it was probably just a technical error. I got rid of the current one. The new sim arrived and everything's back to normal. Aside from the inconvenience I'm surprised, idk what would happen if the wrong person got it. I like to listen to a lot of technology podcast and this is one of those scenarios I would like to know how's that possible?

Privacy

1 Reply

  • MSF's avatar
    MSF
    SMARTY Guru
    03-02-2023

    When you first activated your Smarty sim, it would have had a random number allocated to it. Later, after you gave them a PAC code to transfer your own number across, your account would have then shown your number. At that time, it would have been necessary to 'tell' your phone that it had your proper number because otherwise it would show the random number from the sim that had been inserted.

    Hope this explains it.