I don't think it's that sinister to be honest. I think it's a case of randomly dialing numbers in an area code and all gullible people will press '9'. They can then simply register that number as being a live number in a database and can then sell it on to anyone who needs it. I think the people who press 9 are just opening the floodgates to cold callers.
And by the way hi everyone this is my first post here
