Caller: Some nuisance

This mobile number called my landline in a major city in Australia - I didn't answer and no message was left. I called back about five hrs later and get the Telstra message: "The number you have called is not connected, please check the number before trying again". So that was interesting! Must be a dodgy person.

And I'll tell you, a few hrs later I got a call from a landline number in London, UK. The number is 44 2 070 199 056. It's not the first time from a 442 number and I am almost 100% certain that these are the dodgy people from an online scamming company called "500 Investments" which are based in the UK and also operate out of UK territories like the British Virgin Islands and Cayman Islands and others in the Carribean which have very slack financial accounting laws. And are therefore a haven for fly-by-night investment companies that are experts at smooth-talking you out of your dough but not actually giving you anything back.

I know this because a few years ago I got scammed by these filthy lying prickks and lost about A$550. Not a life threatening amount, but enough to make your blood boil of course. They had a crypto scam ad on Youtube using famous people vouching for it and how much money it had made them (in this case it was Eric Bana) and where you invest a certain amount and you get assigned a slick-talking broker with an accent (overseas of course).

This dubious semi-legit / semi-scamming "500 Investments" company is massive and worldwide. The agent who calls you tries to hook you up with trading online and promising you will be making heaps of money - oh yeah- they always quote the gold bags that you will get if you invest in this magical online trading. And even on the very first phone contact they will try and pump you for more money than you originally signed up with. Plus they will try and get you to install ANYDESK onto your computer while on the phone so they can take ccontrol of your computer and "show you around" the software that they use. Luckily I refused that.

They do have a basic company and website in place and it does work to some degree with the princple amount you deposit in but on further research I found that it is extremely hard to get any return back from them. They have high withdrawal fees, making it a punishment if you want to actually withdraw some of your profits, as well as a lengthy time to wait before you get your money. I have heard that often you don't even get your money. So the money you make from the online trading is theirs. It's a real profitable scam for them.

I saw through this fairly quickly after I had paid my deposit to start the trading with, and I sent numerous emails to them that I wanted to exit and wanted a full refund. Boy was that a nightmare! I was made promises and had to provide all sorts of "proof of identity" and got handballed to various unhelpful people with either no name or some obvious fake English name like Harry Benson etc.

I sent threats of legal action and numerous emails but absolutely not a Snowball's chance in Hell of ever getting a cent back from that $550.

But after that and to this day I have still received dozens of calls, even emails, from different 'agents' around the world including Australia, the UK, the aforementioned Carribean Islands and even one from San Marino, Europe.