Phone Spoofing: What It Is, How It Works, and How STIR/SHAKEN Helps Protect Your Business

Phone spoofing is the falsification of the source ID of a call. In a scam, the criminal can manipulate the Caller ID to make the victim's phone display a different number from the real origin of the call.

This technique is especially dangerous when the spoofed number belongs to a well-known company. The consumer sees a familiar identification and tends to let his guard down.

How call spoofing works

In telephone networks, the caller ID needs to travel along with the call signaling. In environments without strong authentication, a malicious actor may attempt to enter or change this information to present another number to the recipient.

The result is a call that appears to have come from a known bank, company, agency, or contact, even if it originated elsewhere.

What the STIR/SHAKEN changes

STIR/SHAKEN adds cryptographic mechanisms to the flag. The originating network can subscribe to call-related information, and the destination network can verify that signature.

This does not eliminate all phone fraud, but it does make it difficult to impersonate and improves the ability of networks to differentiate authenticated calls from suspicious calls or calls without proper validation.

Why companies need to worry too

Many organizations view phone fraud as only a consumer problem. In practice, the company is also a victim when its identity is misused.

Customers may associate a scam with the real brand

Call centers receive complaints about calls they never made

The reputation of corporate numbers can deteriorate

Legitimate business operations face greater rejection

Confidence in the phone channel decreases

Authentication is different from spam blocking

Anti-spam apps and reputation platforms sort numbers based on data, reports, traffic patterns, and proprietary intelligence. STIR/SHAKEN solves a different problem: origin authentication.

The two approaches can coexist. A mature organization should think about reputation, dial governance, consent, call frequency, and authentication at the same time.

Voicecorp strategy

Voicecorp focuses its offer on STIR/SHAKEN and Verified Origin as a layer of security and trust applied to business telephony. For companies that make a large volume of calls, protecting the identity of the number becomes as important as ensuring voice quality and availability.

PROTECT THE IDENTITY OF YOUR CALLSConnect the STIR/SHAKEN of Voicecorp0800 102 4141 • voicecorp.com.br

References

Anatel - Authentication and Caller ID

ABR Telecom - Identification and Authentication Authority