The Digital Ghost: Unraveling the Secret History of Country Code 0037

Part I: The Immediate Question – Decoding the “0037” Call

 

An unexpected call from an unfamiliar number can be unsettling. When that number begins with a strange prefix like “0037,” curiosity often mixes with caution. For any American who has received such a call, the question is immediate and urgent: Who is calling from country code 0037? The answer is as simple as it is alarming: no one. The international country code +37 is a ghost—a defunct, retired code that no longer represents any country or territory on Earth. A call appearing to originate from this number is not a legitimate communication; it is a digital phantom, almost certainly a component of a sophisticated scam designed to exploit curiosity and defraud the recipient.

 

“Who Called Me From Country Code 0037?” – The Direct Answer and Immediate Threat

 

The appearance of “0037” on a caller ID is a significant red flag. This prefix was once assigned to the German Democratic Republic, more commonly known as East Germany, a nation that ceased to exist with German reunification in 1990. Since its retirement in 1992, the standalone code +37 has not been reassigned. Therefore, any incoming call claiming this origin is, by definition, fraudulent.

This type of call is a classic hallmark of the “one-ring” scam, known in Japan, where it was popularized, as wangiri. The method is simple: scammers, using automated dialing systems, call thousands of numbers and hang up after a single ring. They do not want the victim to answer. Instead, they rely on the recipient seeing a missed call from an unknown international number and being overcome by curiosity or a sense of obligation to call back.

For the American consumer, the financial risk of returning such a call is substantial. The numbers used in these scams are often routed to international premium-rate services, which function like the “900” numbers that were once common in the United States but on a global scale. When a victim calls back, they are immediately connected to a line that incurs exorbitant charges. These fees can include a high per-minute rate on top of standard international calling charges, leading to a shockingly expensive phone bill. Scammers often design these numbers to look like they could be from within the U.S. by using three-digit prefixes, but they are, in fact, international lines, frequently based in the Caribbean or other regions.

The Federal Trade Commission (FTC), the primary consumer protection agency in the United States, has issued explicit warnings about these schemes. The guidance is unequivocal: if you receive a call from an unknown international number that rings once and disconnects, do not call back. Check the number through online directories first; a quick search will often reveal it as part of a known scam. For those who have already fallen victim, the FTC advises attempting to resolve the charges directly with the mobile phone carrier and filing an official complaint at ReportFraud.ftc.gov.

These calls are a pervasive form of imposter scam, a broad category of fraud where criminals impersonate a trusted entity—a business, a government agency, or in this case, a legitimate phone number—to trick victims into sending money or providing personal information. The use of a defunct country code like +37 is a particularly clever tactic. It exploits a gap in public knowledge. While many Americans might recognize common country codes like +44 for the United Kingdom or +52 for Mexico, a code like +37 is an anomaly. It is neither a familiar domestic area code nor a recognizable international one. This ambiguity can pique a person’s curiosity far more than a known foreign number might. A recipient may wonder, “What country is this? Is it new? Could this be an important call I’m missing?” This moment of confusion is precisely what the scammer hopes to induce. The choice of a defunct code is not a random error; it is a calculated psychological lure designed to bypass the victim’s immediate “foreign scam” filter and trigger an “investigation” that tragically begins with dialing the fraudulent number.

 

The Anatomy of a Scam: How Defunct Codes are Weaponized by Technology

 

The ability for a scammer in one part of the world to make a call that appears on a phone in the United States with a false, defunct country code is a feat of modern technology known as Caller ID spoofing. This practice is not a “hack” in the traditional sense of breaching a secure system; rather, it is an exploitation of the fundamental design and inherent vulnerabilities of the global telephone network.

In the past, spoofing a caller ID required specialized and expensive digital connections to the telephone company, such as an Integrated Services Digital Network (ISDN) Primary Rate Interface (PRI) circuit. This high barrier to entry limited its use to entities with significant resources, such as law enforcement agencies, private investigators, and large-scale collection agencies. However, the global proliferation of Voice over IP (VoIP) technology has democratized this capability. With open-source telephony software like Asterisk or FreeSWITCH, and access to a wholesale VoIP provider, virtually anyone with an internet connection can now spoof calls with minimal cost and effort. Many VoIP services allow users to configure their displayed number as a simple setting on a web page, making deception trivially easy.

This ease of manipulation stems from the aging infrastructure that underpins the global telephone system. The network relies on a set of protocols developed in the 1970s called Signaling System No. 7 (SS7). The SS7 network was designed for an era of trusted, state-owned telecommunication monopolies. As such, it was not built with robust security or authentication in mind; it operates on a principle of trust, assuming that the Caller ID information provided by the originating network is accurate. This foundational vulnerability is the loophole that international scammers now drive a truck through, sending calls with falsified information that the recipient’s network has little choice but to display.

Complicating the issue is the fact that not all Caller ID spoofing is illegal or malicious. There are legitimate business reasons for the practice. A large American corporation, for example, might operate a customer service call center in India. To provide a seamless experience for its US customers, the company will want all outgoing calls from its Indian agents to display a single, recognizable US-based toll-free number. This requires spoofing. This legitimate need makes it impossible for regulators to implement a blanket ban on the technology, forcing them to focus on the intent of the spoofer.

In response to the growing crisis of scam calls, the United States has deployed both legal and technical countermeasures. The Truth in Caller ID Act of 2010 makes it illegal to transmit misleading or inaccurate Caller ID information with the intent to defraud, cause harm, or wrongfully obtain anything of value. While a critical legal tool, its effectiveness is limited. Proving intent can be challenging, and it is exceedingly difficult to enforce against scam operations located in foreign jurisdictions with uncooperative law enforcement.

On the technical front, the US telecommunications industry, at the direction of the Federal Communications Commission (FCC), has implemented a framework known as STIR/SHAKEN. These protocols are designed to combat spoofing by creating a system of digital trust. When a call is placed, the originating carrier can “sign” it with a cryptographic certificate, attesting to its legitimacy. As the call traverses the network, subsequent carriers can check this signature to verify that the Caller ID has not been tampered with. This is why many Americans now see labels like “Spam Likely” or “Verified Caller” on their phones. However, STIR/SHAKEN is not a silver bullet. Its implementation is inconsistent across the globe, and it is particularly challenging to apply to international calls that pass through multiple carriers in different countries, some of which may have no legal or technical obligation to participate in the verification process.

This situation creates a profound geopolitical imbalance in the fight against telecommunication fraud. It is a form of asymmetrical warfare. On one side are decentralized networks of criminals, empowered by globalized, low-cost technology like VoIP, operating with impunity from jurisdictions with lax enforcement. On the other side are defenders like the US government and its allies, constrained by national laws, the slow pace of international diplomacy, and the technical challenge of securing a global network not designed for today’s threats. The re-emergence of country code +37, a relic of the Cold War’s rigid, bordered conflict, as a tool in this new kind of borderless, digital crime is deeply ironic. It symbolizes a fundamental shift in the nature of international threats—from state actors behind an Iron Curtain to anonymous criminals exploiting the very globalized infrastructure that was built to bring that divided world together.

 

Part II: A Journey into the Cold War – The Secret History of Country Code +37

 

To understand why the number +37 exists at all, one must journey back to the heart of the 20th century’s defining conflict: the Cold War. The story of this country code is not one of technical standards alone; it is a story of a nation divided, of pervasive surveillance, and of a digital line drawn to match the concrete and barbed wire of the Berlin Wall.

 

A Nation Divided: The Assignment of +37 to the German Democratic Republic (GDR)

 

Following the defeat of Nazi Germany in World War II, the country was partitioned by the Allied powers. This ultimately led to the formal establishment in 1949 of two separate German states: the Federal Republic of Germany (FRG), a federal parliamentary republic aligned with the West, and the German Democratic Republic (GDR), a communist state aligned with the Soviet Union. This political schism created two entirely separate and independent telephone networks, severing a once-unified system and mirroring the deep ideological divide that had descended upon Europe.

The task of organizing the world’s burgeoning international telecommunication system fell to the International Telecommunication Union (ITU), a specialized agency of the United Nations. Beginning in the 1960s, the ITU undertook the monumental task of assigning unique numerical country codes to every nation, allowing for the advent of international direct dialing. This process was inherently political, a reflection of the geopolitical map of the era.

West Germany was assigned the country code +49, a code that the reunified Germany uses to this day. For years, East Germany remained in a state of telephonic limbo. Finally, on March 10, 1966, through bilateral agreements formalized in ITU Notification 980, the German Democratic Republic was officially assigned the country code +37. This assignment was part of the broader 1968 “White Book” update to the global numbering plan, which also saw codes allocated to other politically charged entities of the time, such as the Trucial States (the precursor to the United Arab Emirates).

The existence of two separate country codes for Germany created a “Digital Iron Curtain.” Making a telephone call between the two Germanys was not a domestic affair; it was a complex international procedure that served as a constant, tangible reminder of the nation’s division.

• Calling from West to East: A citizen in West Germany wishing to call a relative in the East had to dial the international access prefix 00, followed by East Germany’s country code 37, and then the specific East German area code and local number.
• Calling from East to West: The process in reverse was different, highlighting the lack of standardization. A person in East Germany had to dial their unique international access prefix, 06, followed by West Germany’s country code 49, and then the West German number.

This system was a daily bureaucratic manifestation of the political reality. Two peoples, sharing a language and a history, were separated not only by a physical wall but also by the technical protocols of the global telephone network.

 

Life Behind the Wall: Telecommunications and Surveillance in the GDR

 

The telecommunication system within the German Democratic Republic was a direct reflection of the state itself: centrally planned, economically strained, and repurposed as an instrument of total social control. The network’s infrastructure was generally inferior to that of the West, a disparity that would become a major obstacle during reunification. It also featured unique technical oddities, such as a complex system of “canonical” and “shortcut” prefixes designed to bypass central switching offices and reduce toll charges between certain cities—a workaround indicative of a network built with non-standard topology under economic constraints.

The divided city of Berlin was a telephonic world unto itself, governed by a set of byzantine rules designed to navigate the political sensitivities of the Cold War. As neither side officially recognized the other as a “foreign country,” direct international dialing protocols were sidestepped. Instead, special prefixes were established. A West Berliner could call someone in East Berlin by dialing 0372, treating it as if it were just another West German area code. Conversely, an East Berliner could reach West Berlin by dialing the prefix 8-49, as if making a local call. These exceptions were a tacit acknowledgment of Berlin’s unique, and uniquely fraught, status as the epicenter of the Cold War.

Far more sinister than these technical quirks was the role the telephone network played in the state’s apparatus of surveillance. The Ministry for State Security (Ministerium für Staatssicherheit), universally known as the Stasi, was one of the most effective and repressive secret police forces in modern history. Its primary mission was to spy on its own people, and the telephone was one of its most powerful weapons.

The Stasi’s reach was nearly absolute, achieved through a monstrously vast network of informants, or inoffizielle Mitarbeiter (unofficial collaborators). Official figures suggest one Stasi officer for every 166 citizens, but when the legions of part-time snoops and regular informants are included, the ratio is estimated to have been as high as one informer for every 6.5 people. These informants were woven into the fabric of society; they were janitors, doctors, teachers, and tram conductors—people whose jobs gave them access and frequent contact with the public. They reported on their neighbors, colleagues, and even family members.

Alongside this human network, the Stasi employed a wide array of technical surveillance methods. Agents routinely tapped phone lines, bugged apartments and hotel rooms, and drilled tiny holes in walls to film citizens with hidden cameras. Mail was systematically intercepted, with special machines developed that could steam open 600 letters an hour for copying and analysis before they were resealed and sent on their way.

Perhaps the most bizarre and invasive of all Stasi techniques was the practice of “scent profiling.” In an effort to create a comprehensive catalog of its citizens, the Stasi collected human smells. During interrogations, a suspect would be made to sit on a chair, often for hours. Unbeknownst to them, a specially treated cloth was concealed within the seat cushion. This cloth would absorb the individual’s perspiration and unique body odor. After the interrogation, the cloth was removed and sealed in an airtight glass jar, labeled with the person’s details. These “scent samples” were stored in archives and could be used by the Stasi’s specially trained sniffer dogs to track a dissident or to confirm their presence at a secret meeting or illicit location. This practice, while not admissible in court at the time, was a powerful tool for a security service that operated without legal limitation.

The East German telephone system, therefore, was far more than mere infrastructure. It was a direct manifestation of the state’s core ideology. Its technical separation from the West, its internal inefficiencies, and its complete co-option by the Stasi were all reflections of a closed, centrally planned, and deeply paranoid society. The very act of picking up a telephone in the GDR was to engage with a system designed to control, to monitor, and to enforce the will of the state. The contrast with the West’s open, market-driven, and (at least comparatively) private telecommunication networks highlights the profound ideological chasm of the Cold War, written in the language of dialing codes and copper wire. The Stasi’s practice of scent profiling represents the ultimate, chilling expression of this ideology: the state’s ambition to catalog and control not just what a citizen said or did, but their very physical essence.

 

Part III: The Code’s Afterlife: Reunification and Rebirth

 

Like the state it represented, country code +37 was destined to have a short and politically charged life. Its demise was triggered by one of the most iconic events of the late 20th century, and its subsequent rebirth as a new series of codes tells a story of a continent redefining itself in the wake of the Cold War’s collapse.

 

The Fall of the Wall and the Retirement of a Country Code

 

The beginning of the end for the German Democratic Republic, and for its country code, came on the evening of November 9, 1989. The event that triggered the fall of the Berlin Wall was, fittingly for a story about communication, a colossal blunder in a press conference. Facing mounting protests and pressure to reform, the East German government decided to ease its strict travel restrictions. A mid-level official, Günter Schabowski, was handed a note about the new policy just before a live international press conference but was not fully briefed on its details or intended timeline.

When pressed by reporters about when the new rules would take effect, a flustered Schabowski scanned the document and, finding no date, famously stammered, “As far as I know… effective immediately, without delay”. The news flashed across television and radio stations in both East and West Berlin. Within minutes, thousands of jubilant East Berliners swarmed the checkpoints along the Wall. The border guards, who had received no new orders and were unable to get clear instructions from their superiors over the phone, were overwhelmed. Faced with a massive, unstoppable crowd, they eventually opened the gates. The Berlin Wall had fallen, not by military command, but by a cascade of miscommunication and popular will.

This chaotic, human-driven event set the stage for the formal, technical process of German reunification, which was officially completed on October 3, 1990. This political union presented an unprecedented economic and technical challenge: the merging of a modern, prosperous capitalist economy with a collapsed, state-run socialist one. This challenge was perfectly mirrored in the telecommunications sector. The monumental task was to absorb the GDR’s outdated and inefficient telephone network into West Germany’s advanced system, unifying them under a single country code: +49.

The +37 code was officially slated for retirement. The technical switchover took place on April 15, 1992. On that day, the area codes of the former East Germany were formally integrated into the West German numbering plan. For example, the code for the city of Leipzig, which had been +37-41, became +49-341, and the code for Erfurt, formerly +37-61, became +49-361. For a short period, permissive dialing was in effect, allowing calls to the old numbers to connect, but the transition was swift and decisive. Country code +37 was officially history.

This technical integration was a small part of a much larger, and often painful, economic shock for the citizens of the former East. The East German industrial base, which had been propped up by state subsidies and shielded from competition, proved entirely unviable in the new market economy. Within a year of unification, industrial production in the East had fallen by more than half, and the number of unemployed soared above 3 million. The East’s infrastructure, from its roads and railways to its power grid and telephone service, was woefully inadequate and required hundreds of billions of dollars in investment from the West. The state of the East German telephone network served as a direct and measurable indicator of the country’s overall economic and technological lag. Its poor condition was a tangible barrier to the Western investment needed for recovery, a small-scale reflection of the staggering overall cost of integrating the two nations.

The rapid, and at times ruthless, privatization and takeover of Eastern industries by Western firms led to a profound sense of social dislocation and loss for many East Germans. This gave rise to a cultural phenomenon known as Ostalgie—a complex nostalgia for certain aspects of daily life in the GDR. This feeling, combined with persistent economic and wage disparities, created social divisions between “Ossis” (Easterners) and “Wessis” (Westerners) that have endured for decades, shaping the political and cultural landscape of unified Germany to this day.

 

From the Ashes: The Modern +37x Country Codes

The retirement of country code +37 was a unique event in the history of the ITU. Instead of simply being deleted and archived, its removal “freed up” the entire 37x numbering block, creating a new, open range of three-digit codes for the ITU to assign.

The timing of this event was serendipitous. The early 1990s were a period of immense geopolitical upheaval in Europe. The collapse of the Soviet Union in 1991 (which had used the single country code +7) and the violent breakup of Yugoslavia (which had used +38) created a sudden and urgent need for new, distinct country codes for a host of newly independent nations. The newly available

+37x block was the perfect solution.

A wave of former Soviet republics, eager to assert their new sovereignty and shed the vestiges of Russian domination, were assigned codes from this block:

• +370 was assigned to Lithuania
• +371 was assigned to Latvia
• +372 was assigned to Estonia
• +373 was assigned to Moldova
• +374 was assigned to Armenia
• +375 was assigned to Belarus

Simultaneously, the +37x block provided an opportunity for several of Europe’s smallest microstates to achieve full telephonic sovereignty. For decades, these tiny nations had their telephone services integrated into the networks of their larger neighbors. The new block allowed them to have their own distinct international identity:

• +376 was assigned to Andorra, which had previously used France’s country code +33.
• +377 was assigned to Monaco, which had also been integrated into the French +33 system.
• +378 was assigned to San Marino, which had previously been reachable via Italy’s +39 code.
• +379 was assigned to Vatican City, although it continues to primarily use its traditional access through Italy’s network via +39-06698.

Thus, the country code born from the division of Germany found its afterlife in the reunification of Europe. The ghost of +37 gave rise to a new family of codes that represent the independence and integration of nations across the continent.

 

Part IV: A Broader Perspective for the US Caller

 

Understanding the strange story of country code +37 provides a fascinating glimpse into modern history, but it also serves as a practical lesson in how the global telephone system works. For an American making an international call, knowing the correct procedure and understanding the different types of codes can prevent confusion and costly mistakes. The history of +37 is not an isolated incident; the world’s dialing plan is dotted with the echoes of other fallen nations and redrawn borders.

 

How International Calling Works: A Guide for the US Audience

 

Placing an international call from the United States involves a standard sequence of numbers. While it may seem complex, it follows a consistent logic designed to route the call from a local US network to a specific phone line anywhere in the world.

The process consists of four key components:

1. The US Exit Code: To signal to the American telephone network that you intend to make an international call, you must first dial 011. This is the standard international access prefix for all countries within the North American Numbering Plan (NANP), which includes the US, Canada, and many Caribbean nations. When dialing from a mobile phone, the plus symbol (

   +) can be used as a universal substitute for the exit code.
2. The Country Code: Immediately after the exit code, you dial the numerical country code of the nation you wish to reach. For example, the country code for the United Kingdom is 44, for Mexico it is 52, and for Germany it is 49.
3. The Area Code (or City Code): Next, you dial the regional area code. A crucial rule for international callers is to drop the leading zero if it is present in the local version of the number. This initial zero is a “trunk code” used only for domestic calls within that country. For instance, a local Berlin number might be written as 030-xxxxxxx. When calling from the US, you would drop the 0 and dial only the 30.
4. The Local Phone Number: Finally, you dial the recipient’s local phone number.

A practical example of calling a landline in Berlin, Germany (area code 30) with the local number 123-4567 from the United States would be: 011 - 49 - 30 - 1234567

Calling a mobile phone in Germany follows a similar pattern, but instead of a geographic area code, you dial a mobile network code, which is typically a three-digit number beginning with 1 (e.g., 15x, 16x, 17x) after the +49 country code.

It is also important for the US user to understand the distinction between the different types of country codes they may encounter online or in documents:

• ITU Telephone Codes: These are the numerical dialing codes (e.g., +49) assigned by the International Telecommunication Union for the purpose of connecting calls on the public telephone network.
• ISO Country Codes: These are alphabetic codes established by the International Organization for Standardization. The most common are the two-letter (alpha-2) and three-letter (alpha-3) codes. They are used for a wide variety of purposes, including postal services, banking, and internet top-level domains (TLDs). For Germany, the ISO codes are DE and DEU. These codes are often derived from the country’s name in its native language—in this case, Deutschland. So, while you dial

  +49 to call Germany, its internet addresses end in .de.

 

Echoes of History in Your Phone: Other Defunct Country Codes

 

Country codes are not static; they are living artifacts of geopolitical history. They are born with new nations, die with fallen ones, and are sometimes reborn in new forms. The story of East Germany’s +37 is a dramatic example, but it is not unique. The global dialing plan is a graveyard of codes that tell stories of war, revolution, and the shifting sands of sovereignty, many of which are tied directly to the end of the Cold War.

Case Study 1: The Violent Fragmentation of Yugoslavia (+38) For decades, the Socialist Federal Republic of Yugoslavia, a diverse federation of six republics, existed under the single telephone country code +38. Following the death of its longtime leader Josip Broz Tito and the rise of nationalism, the country disintegrated into a series of brutal wars in the early 1990s. As the federation shattered, so did its telephone code. On October 1, 1993, the ITU retired the

+38 code and implemented a new +38x series for the newly independent (or soon-to-be-independent) states. The new codes were cleverly formed by taking 38 and adding the first digit of each republic’s old domestic area code. For example, Slovenia, whose area codes began with 6, was assigned +386. Croatia (4 and 5) was assigned +385, and Serbia was assigned +381. This process illustrates a different model from East Germany’s: not absorption, but fragmentation.

Case Study 2: The Peaceful Divorce of Czechoslovakia (+42) Czechoslovakia, another state born from the ashes of empire after World War I, used the country code +42 for decades. Following the collapse of communist rule in 1989, nationalist sentiments in the two constituent parts of the federation, the Czech lands and Slovakia, led to a negotiated separation. In what became known as the “Velvet Divorce,” the country peacefully split into two new sovereign nations on January 1, 1993. Mirroring this amicable split, the country code

+42 was retired. In its place, two new codes were created, echoing the +37x model: +420 for the new Czech Republic and +421 for Slovakia. The country’s two-letter ISO code,

CS, was also retired and replaced by CZ and SK.

Case Study 3: The Unification of Yemen (+969) On the southern tip of the Arabian Peninsula, another Cold War division played out. For years, the region was split between the Yemen Arab Republic (North Yemen), which used country code +967, and the People’s Democratic Republic of Yemen (South Yemen), a Marxist-Leninist state backed by the Soviet Union, which used country code +969. With the waning of Soviet influence, the two states entered into unification talks, officially merging to form the Republic of Yemen on May 22, 1990. In the telecommunications realm, the solution was simple: the southern code,

+969, was retired, and the entire unified country adopted the northern code, +967, which it uses to this day. This demonstrates a third model of code transition: simple absorption of one network into another.

These examples, all rooted in the geopolitical transformations of the late 20th century, show that the numbers we dial are more than just technical addresses. They are a coded history of our world, a digital ledger of the rise and fall of nations.