How do scammers and robots call from already existing phone numbers?

Question

Like today I got a bot call from a number, then a person called me from that number asking if I had called THEM because they had a missed call from me…

EDIT:Thank you to all who answered! I understand now.

In: Technology

Answer 1

A good way to think about it is this, someone lies and tells you their name is tom, but when you shout tom at them someone else who is actually named tom answers but not the one who told you their name. Your phone doesn’t know who us calling it, so it asks, if the other end lies and says it’s someone else the phone doesn’t know any better, but when you try to call it back it goes to the actual number.