Christopher
Stoll

Strange Text Messages Decoded

Occasionally I will receive some unusual SMS messages on my cell phone from numbers that I don't recognize. Some of the text messages seem to be questions, while others are locations or cryptic statements. At first I thought that they could be some sort of SMS spam. Latter I started to think that my phone number might just be similar to that of some very popular person, and their friends were mistyping the number. In any case I would just delete the message and not think much of it.

Today I received the message "define: paraphyletic". Then it finally struck me that I must have a number that is similar to one proved by some sort of SMS answer service. Sure enough, if you type Google on a phone, the numbers are 466453. If another number is accidentally inserted in the right place, it becomes my phone number.

Now that I know this I can have some fun with people who mistype Google into their phone.
Published: 2009-03-13
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