We don’t answer phone calls from callers we don’t know. Oddly enough, we got a call yesterday from a telemarketer with the caller ID showing the last name of a woman we know as the first name And the first name of another acquaintance as the last name on the caller ID.
How can that happen?
Can land line phones be hacked?

Just wait till you see your own number show up as the incoming number. Have seen my own several times. Thanks to the computer generated call list used to disguise their real identity for what ever reason. And once you answer the call I believe that your number is transfered to a list of possible live sales/victims. ................drill sgt.

Landline?
They aren’t hacking your phone, necessarily, but the caller ID database from the phone company.

Caller ID is easily spoofed. They can put whatever name and number they want in there.

wxdave is correct, the caller can send anything they want, a specific number, or name and number information, it is just a data packet sent between rings. The only saving grace is that most phone spammers don't go to the trouble.

It is actually a little more complicated in practice. Most phone OS's, iOS and Android for example, try to be helpful to the phone owner by looking up the number received in CID in the phone's address book, and displaying the "best match" to the called party. They don't always get this right, nor does everybody maintain their phonebook in a rigorous way.

It may not be obvious when we are talking "land lines", but spoofing Caller ID is very easy with VoIP lines. A traditional POTS line, not so much. I think telescammers use VoIP lines because they are cheap, and can be 'local' from anywhere in the world.

We too do not answer calls (land line or cells) fromn those not on (in) our list of contacts. What pisses me off is these telemarketeers are smart enough to spoof but can't understand

"Please leave a message at the tone".

Tinyman

^^^

Most calls are made by autodialer and "handed off" to a person as soon as the call is answered, but voice mail routing typically does not "trigger" a hand-off, and the computer drops the call.

It was spooky the first time I got a call from myself on the landline.

I know they spoof other people’s numbers, even our own, but this time they combined the first and last names of people we actually know!
That, to us, was an interesting new wrinkle.

I feel like recording the following message, “Psychic hotline. Don’t bother leaving a message. I know who you are and what you want. Wait for my call.”