I mean, I've been harassed by years for a debt that doesn't even belong to me, but rather to the person who previously had my phone number. Over the years I have learned their name, address, name of one of their family members, amount of the debt, and who the debt was originally owed to (a local government agency no less). The debt collectors shouldn't have disclosed any of this to me but they did, unprompted, often in voice mail. Mailed threats have been unsuccessful in stopping the calls, as when I send a nastygram to one collector they seem to just sell the debt on to another.

I guess my point is that the legal protections against harassment do exist but are not effective. It's not even my debt and I have a master's degree and generous income and I ended up changing my phone number in order to stop multiple calls per day. So to whoever ends up getting that number assigned, sorry about Esteban's $8k in back tuition and good luck.

The irony is that my new phone number also gets calls from debt collectors, but far less often. It seems the debt was either smaller or sold into a less predatory corner of the industry.