If the Text Is Coming From Your Own Phone, Beware

If you get a spam text message that appears to have come from your own phone number, watch out. Verizon says it's getting complaints from customers who say they're getting spammed by, apparently, themselves—in actuality, scammers are spoofing the customers' own phone numbers—and it's making it trickier than usual to avoid the texts. "We can't block ourselves," reads one sample complaint from a customer cited by CBS News. "What's the solution?" Per Verizon, and other experts, for now the solution is to not click on any links in the text, and to delete the message. You can also file a "Your Number Is Being Spoofed" complaint with the FCC.

The wireless carrier says it is working on the issue in an effort to get to "the source to prevent any further messages." Chris Welch documented his experience with the scam texts at the Verge. "As best my iPhone could tell, it was a legitimate message from me to myself," he writes. "Tapping into the sender details took me to my own contact card." While frustrating, he says there's no need to panic: If it happens to you, your actual phone number hasn't been hijacked, just subjected to "technological impersonation." Many people who clicked on the links they received in such texts report being directed to Russian websites. (More Verizon stories.)