Do debt collectors have access to your privacy?

Spend one day with me, and you'll find that I carry similar qualities to The Dude, from the Big Lebowski. Except I'm significantly shorter and younger. I've got the long hair, walk around everywhere in my pajamas with my ever growing shoulder length hair, enjoy drinking a nice fucking White Russian every other hour. A recent graduate that would approach everyone's personal problems, my own included with an exponentially festering degree of nihilism. Mind you, I wasn't always like this, I would actually argue I was one of the hardest workers you would ever meet a few years ago, the work hard, play nothing type of person, always working to defeat my opponent by perfecting the artform of my work, when he or she was sleeping I was working, when he or she was playing, I was working. But over the past two years I've spent my days investing in Crypto, day in and day out. First learning to play with 5 bucks then 50, then 500, and finally 5K. Originally forewarned that investing in crytpo is dangerous for a first time investor, especially for a recent college grad with no studies in money management. I'm the guy that would play campaign on Resident Evil 4 with his best friend/cousin, get to the end and found that I never spent a dime on the dedicated merchant who would always ask, "Watcha' buying stranger?!" I finished the game with only the basic weaponry gifted to me from the beginning of the game. I would agree that I'm a stingy bastard, and far from having poor money management skills, with the exception that I've become a risky trader over a period of time with adequate success, with a combination of luck due to the market demand and some common knowledge for trading. I developed enough capital in Crypto to pay off my student loans easily, even with my shitty supervisory position in my day job, (but chose not pay it off right away since the gov. pays off my interest every year come tax time) I pay my bills a few days in advance except for the one day I paid 4 hours late to Navient because I didn't realize they based their due times on EST (I'm on the West Coast ). So what's the point of this post? I'm getting there, I just needed to attempt to establish that I'm a decently responsible person who just rides the waves of crypto while sipping my occasional white Russian.

For the past 2 months, I've been receiving calls from a number that my phone would once note as (408) ...... myself being a recent nihilist graduate hoping to make a little more money to invest in my crypto portfolio would answer the phone because I was expecting a call back from a number in the Bay Area (408 is a Bay area number, my iPhone would note it as Aptos, CA) for a job I had recently applied for; but every time I pressed that eagerly and nervously pressed that green accept button and greeted the person with my most professional tone... I only got silence sometimes for 30 seconds to a minute before the line clicked. This was happening for a about a month and eventually began answer with my most unprofessional response, "what up dawg," and finally got the call I was expecting. I respectfully declined the job because my crypto had done pretty well and decided I had enough to continue investing full time. But the calls kept coming.... at first they would come when I would unlock my phone and enter my Kraken, Coinbase, Poloniex, Bitrrex, Robinhood, Bitmex, Chase, and Wells Fargo accounts; not immediately of course but only after about 1-2 minutes of reviewing my account balances, and mind you, only on my Iphone, not any other device. I didn't pay much attention to it at first but realized I never got the calls unless I was logging onto the accounts and examining my account balances. If I logged on only to look at charts, then nothing.... I would spend a week not looking at crypto or rarely using my phone.. again nothing... And when I would rarely answer the call I would get no response. I got a little paranoid, so reformatted my phone and activated 2 Factor Authentication across every account I have including emails, and found that I had a couple of failed attempts into my accounts. The calls slowed down, then the calls began to arrive aggressively, now also calling when I was talking about my account balances or business plans in accordance with my balances in private with a parent. Please note, the calls would come in about a minute or two after mentioning my balances... without even touching my phone. Then the calls began to drop in when I was watching a video on the Tube, or enjoying/analyzing a film from the Hub or face timing family or friends. I will admit I have dealt with similar calls before, I had a dear friend who has listed me for these calls in case of need for a debit collector to step in for his absence or late payment. I don't mind it. I would eventually answer and find it was another debit collector....

I notified my dearest friend, reminding him that I didn't mind him listing my number. What I did begin to mind however... was access to my accounts and my privacy. I had no concrete evident to prove my theory. My nihilism began to subside around this time. Some may think that this friend was attempting to breach these accounts earlier... But I was able to verify the actual balances due and the existing debt collector, he won't share the balance due. I went as far as changing my number and phone to verify this without notifying anyone + I needed an additional phone to maintain my crypto. But the calls still seeped in. Has anyone else encountered something similar? I've changed my emails and made complex passwords on a foreign computer. Again I've gone lengths to verify. They also call excessively if my friend who owes the money is next to me.