Guides

Anyone in Switzerland who sits on a board or runs a company appears in the commercial register: with name, place of origin and municipality of residence. The law provides for this, and the entry cannot be deleted.

It becomes delicate when the company is domiciled at your home address. Then the register shows not only the municipality but the street and house number. A domicile address with a fiduciary or a law firm solves that.

Credit reference agencies and directories take the details from the register and add to them. There you can demand deletion. In most cantons you can also ask the residents’ registration office of your municipality to block disclosure of your details.

Today a voice can be copied from a few seconds of recording, taken from an interview or a voice message, for instance. The number displayed can be faked too.

Agree a word within the family that is never written down and never sent. Anyone who asks for money or for help on the phone says it. Anyone who does not know it is not who they claim to be.

In business the same applies as a procedure: every payment instruction given by call or message is confirmed by a second route that you have set beforehand. Time pressure is no reason for an exception. It is the clearest warning sign.

Do not pay. Those who pay are asked again, and the material has not gone away afterwards.

Delete nothing. Messages, profiles and payment addresses are evidence. Take screenshots and note the times.

Do not reply, and do not change any passwords on the affected device. If someone is reading along there, they learn the new ones at once.

Get help before you decide anything: someone you trust, your lawyer, the police. In Switzerland, every cantonal police force will take a report.

Many accounts can be reset with a code sent by text message. Anyone who moves your number to a SIM card of their own receives those codes in your place.

Ask your mobile provider for a lock: a change of SIM card or of provider is then possible only in person or with an additional password.

Switch your most important accounts: email, Apple or Google, bank. Instead of codes by text message, an app that produces the code on your phone or, better, a small key that you hold in your hand.