You hear your telephone ringing and you look downward to see who it is, when you observe that your own name shows up as the caller ID. Is it yourself calling from the future? Maybe just a glitch with your phone? The latter is far more possible, simply there are too several other possibilities.

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Information technology's Probably a Spam Caller

Here's the virtually likely scenario: information technology'south just a spammer or telemarketer spoofing the caller ID.

Instead of showing their ain phone number on your caller ID, it shows your own telephone number as a way to hide theirs. It seems counter-intuitive because it might raise more than eyebrows, but they're betting that you're more than likely to pick upwards the phone if the caller ID says "unknown", "private caller", or fifty-fifty your own telephone number than if it says "Telemarketing, Inc".

In addition, while their phone number might be on a blacklist, your own phone number most definitely isn't, and so it's a clever style to get effectually that roadblock.

You might have even seen phone numbers calling you that are very similar to your own number, and it might be off by just i or two numbers. This is also another method of spoofing and it's likely a spammer or telemarketer on the other end.

It Could Merely Be a Problems, Though

Of course, there could also be any number of ways that your phone could call itself past accident, and sometimes it could just be a problems in the software.

One user says that someone called him while he was on the phone with someone else and instead of switching to the new call and putting the current caller on hold, he ended the call, which prompted his ain telephone to call itself.

This can likewise happen with VoIP phones, where if you punch a number and then hang upward, the phone call can get haywire and the phone volition call itself instead, most likely because the phone knows that information technology needed to brand a call, but didn't know who to phone call, then it just calls itself.

If you have an iPhone, Siri has the ability to place a call to your own telephone. You tin do this on purpose past telling Siri to "call myself". And so, information technology'south always possible that Siri might mishear something yous say and call your own phone, especially if you have Hey Siri enabled, where it's e'er listening for a command.

In Any Instance, Only Don't Respond It

Whatever the cause may be, the all-time course of action to take is just just not answering information technology. After all, it's probably not you from the time to come, so you won't be missing an of import call past leaving it unanswered. Nothing expert or worthwhile will come from answering your phone that shows your own number as the caller ID.

There are a few exceptions, of class. You might need to purposely call your own number when y'all set upward your voicemail or admission certain carrier settings.

You can also call yourself to get out of a coming together or gracefully bail on a bad date by using a service called IFTTT, just it uses its ain phone number to phone call your phone whenever you need it to.

Image Credit: Jon Phillips/Flickr