Urban Legends: 999 Phone Charging

Photo By Randy Lu

In 2012 rumor was spread around in the BlackBerry forums that if you call 999 it charges the battery. 999 is the emergency number in the United Kingdom. So those who believed it would make lots of false calls to law enforcement. It was so bad that in 2013 Derbyshire Constabulary had a press release telling the public that calling 999 doesn't charge your phone, but in fact wastes law enforcement time and help for those who need it. If there were calls with quick hangups or left in silence police would have to try to get in contact with the cell phone user to make sure there was no emergency. It was illegal for them to misuse the number. 

Whoever posted this in forums probably thought of it as a joke and likely didn't think people would be dumb enough to do it. 

SOURCES:

Urban Legendpedia

Wikipedia