Woman Tracks Down Stranger Who Has Been Giving Out Her Phone Number for 17 Years

For nearly two decades, one Reddit user says she couldn’t escape the digital shadow of a stranger every time her phone rang.

What began in middle school with a brand-new flip phone turned into 17 years of wrong numbers, spammy offers and constant confusion — all aimed at someone else.

According to her Reddit post, the problem started “within the first week” of getting her first phone in 2008.

From debt collectors and cruise giveaways to student loan forgiveness programs, everyone seemed to be chasing the same woman — a person the Redditor refers to as “Vanessa Crunkle” for the sake of privacy.

“Vanessa gives my phone number out for everything,” she wrote, adding that the name was so “distinctive” she initially assumed it had to be fake.

Instead, the barrage of calls only grew. She says she received nearly four calls a day from credit card companies, dental offices and auto insurance agencies — all asking for Vanessa.

For years, she just rolled her eyes and moved on. Eventually, curiosity (and frustration) got the better of her.

Using the area code Vanessa consistently gave out, she searched public records and discovered that the elusive woman was very real — and working at a community college near her hometown.

Along with that, she says, came “several news articles about her being involved in the union, and also an incredibly easy to find email address.”

Finding Vanessa raised a new question: should she finally reach out and ask her to stop?

All she really wanted to say was, “Literally why, it’s been 17 years you’re tormenting me. Please please please stop giving out my phone number. Use your own!”

Still, she admitted that contacting Vanessa through a work email felt a bit uncomfortable.

“I see little potential fall out with reaching out to her via email (I won’t be mean, I promise) except for the fact that I’m going to be reaching out through her work email address. Is it weird? Sure. But so is giving out a phone number that isn’t yours for nearly two decades,” she wrote.

Her other idea? Turning the tables by using Vanessa’s email to sign up for random promotions and mailing lists — “a little more evil,” as she put it.

“Nothing devastating, but basically spamming the spammer,” she explained, asking Reddit for advice on which route to take.

After commenters chimed in, she shared a playful update: she’d decided that the best plan “is to reach out BUT from a new Gmail!”

Emailing from her personal account, she joked, “seems sketch,” and despite plenty of people suggesting she simply change her number, she refused. She says she has “a very strange but valid sentimentality” about her unusual area code and long-held phone number — even if it comes with a built-in stranger named Vanessa.