British Columbia's Better Business Bureau has issued a warning to the public about phone scammers allegedly using the agency's name to collect sensitive information about local companies.

According to the BBB, callers claiming to be from the "Better Business Bureau Vancouver" have been running what's known as a "directory scam." These involve callers who ask to confirm details such as the size of the business's operation, its phone number, address, the number of employees and whether the it has plans to relocate.

"Naturally, we are concerned about the resurgence of this scam as BBB's name as an agency trusted by both businesses and consumers is being used to deceive business owners into sharing information," manager of community and public relations Karla Davis said in a statement.

In directory scams, the caller claims to be updating the directory or contact list for the organization they say they're calling from. The target business will often receive an invoice for hundreds of dollars several weeks after the fraudulent call for an ad or listing in said directory.

"When the business calls to complain, they may be informed that an employee verbally confirmed the placement," the BBB said. "In many cases, the scammer even plays back a spliced version of the previous conversation with the employee. The altered recording makes it sound like the employee agreed to the charge, when, in fact, he or she was simply confirming the accuracy of the information."

According to Davis, "these scam calls have been happening on and off for several years, and in some instances, they have even pretended to be from Canada Revenue Agency or some other government office that is doing a survey."

In a similar scam from 2015, callers claimed to represent the "B.C. business development office, formerly BBB." A BBB investigation into the calls revealed that no such organization existed.

"These calls are not only annoying and invasive, but the use of BBB's name is illegal," Davis said. "The information being requested by the callers suggests that this scam is likely to be either a strategy to generate sales leads for moving companies, prior to the start of the moving season in May or part of a directory scam."

Davis said the scammers can be difficult to track down because they often use technology to disguise the phone numbers they're calling from as a different number.

Attempts to call these numbers back often lead to the person whose number was used in the fraudulent call or simply a busy signal.

How to protect yourself and your businesses

The BBB is simply advising the public to avoid these calls and to hang up on anyone who starts asking these types of questions.

According to the agency, business owners should make sure to inform their staff of these types of scams and train employees to keep information private until the legitimacy of the caller can be confirmed.

Anyone who has concerns about this or any other scam can contact the BBB at 604-682-2711 or visit the agency's website to report a scam.