Comment by gwbas1c
1 year ago
It seems like they're targeting the symptom instead of the problem.
One of the biggest problems with robocalls is that it's really impossible to know who's calling you, and that SPAM reporting tools don't have much teeth.
IE, when I have an incoming call, I should be able to see who's liable for the call. IE, "[phone number] is registered to [Person or corporation]", and that reports of spam should impede that party's ability to use the phone network.
As long as 1% or more of voters in Pennsylvania keep voting based on whomever talked to them last; and as long as Super PACs can continue to receive unlimited anonymous money; no media channel will be legally restricted from spamming people. Phone spam is too effective politically.
I don't think there's much evidence to suggest that robocalls produce material swings in elections at all, let alone 1%, a number commonly attributed to all campaign GOTV efforts put together.
https://www.cambridge.org/core/journals/journal-of-experimen...
3-7 votes per 1k calls
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Not honest ones anyways...
Robocalls every election season go out to targeted communities telling them the wrong polling location.
I will leave as an exercise to the reader what political slant those communities almost always have. The impact of those must be very hard to measure.
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I don't see any reason we can't ban everything but political speech given its status as extra-super-protected.
This was my thought too. While I do think going after this kind of scam is a good first step, I don't see overseas operators not using this any less. Most spam calls I get don't follow the do not call list, why would they follow this either?
I think the FCC needs to step up and have a hard deadline for STIR/SHAKEN with fines for operators who don't comply. That is the only way, IMHO, that the VOIP operators will take it seriously.
I think "SHAKEN/STIR" is supposed to fix this long term. I'm not sure why it's taking so long, but I believe phones will already indicate if the phone call has a verified caller id. Probably next step is to just block any non-verified caller. I'm assuming there's just a lot of migration work to happen.
https://www.fcc.gov/call-authentication
I would say that money is the root of the problem. I think that most VOIP providers don't want to loose out on unencrypted traffic (both legitimate and spam).
Also, why do I seem to always get spam from a few providers? And why aren't we holding them accountable?
Money is always the problem. In the carrier world, the party accepting ("terminating") the call gets paid by the party originating it. This is why there are VoIP services that will give you a free inbound-only number and why others only charge for outbound calls.
If you're a carrier, it pays to terminate all calls -- spam or not -- by delivering them to your actual customer. You get paid by the originating carrier, and in a lot of cases you also get to charge your customer per-minute fees (or use up their prepaid minutes).
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Currently, STIR/SHAKEN is only required for VOIP and intermediate carriers but a lot of carriers have implemented or are in progress. Here's a recent report from the GSMA: https://www.gsma.com/get-involved/gsma-membership/gsma_resou...
> Signed traffic between Tier-1 carriers increased to 85% in 2023
We're getting there, just not soon enough. The whole world will have transitioned to never answering their phone before this actually is fully enforced.
My spam volume has fallen to close to zero recently. AT&T seems to be blocking quite a few of them.
I also get very few spam calls, but I ended up buying Verizon's thing that prevents spam calls. It is all a scam but before signing up I got a ton of spam.
(What makes me sad is that I mostly use Google Voice; and that blocks spam pretty well. But people can still call my actual mobile number by guessing it, and they do.)
Google Voice has gotten somewhat difficult recently because some API-to-SMS services consider it "VOIP", and so they flat-out refuse to send text messages. Some places do this on purpose (Discord won't let me use it for 2FA because 2FA is really their anti-spam mechanism, not a security feature), and some places do it by accident (I couldn't add my Fidelity FSA debit card to Apple Pay because it simply won't send the verification code to my number on file). So some people have my "real" phone number now and it makes me sad, but that's why they call it the Internet Of Shit. (I don't even WANT SMS 2FA. Less secure than making your password 1234. Harder to use than a Nomad. Please let me use my Yubikey or a Passkey.)
It's already possible to lookup the carrier of a number, and I'd love for the ability to be listed under their location on the incoming call screen. Makes a big difference if the call is coming from T-Mobile or some company you've never heard of.
I think this is antithetical to most people’s view of privacy on this platform :)
Make it an option. I should be able to block my number from the receiver of the call if I choose. The receiver should be notified the number is blocked and can choose accordingly. The fact that numbers can be spoofed is what should be illegal. Any company making calls should have to identify themselves to the person receiving the call.
I think if you want to make an anonymous call, you need to find a party that will be liable for your call.
Do most people actually care about being able to place phone calls and be anonymous in 2024? If I call someone it's either someone who has my number already or someone who is going to ask who it is (like a business) and I'm going to tell them who I am.
Doctor's offices and schools are notorious for using the caller ID "blocked." I let them hit voicemail.
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There are many valid reasons for making anonymous calls in 2024, including but not limited to being able to suss out information without exposing ones on identity.
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Crazy to think phonebooks published your name, number, and even address. Much smaller world.
They still do. If you’ve made any public transaction (like buying a home), Whitepages will publish your info. That’s not the only reason for it, either. My 90 year-old relative was listed, and she doesn’t own anything.
Yes. What happened to that? It's interesting that we became more private in that regard while gushing personal information from sensors worn on our bodies 24/7.
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When I visited the FCC many years ago, one fo the reasons they give for allowing anonymous calls is the the protection of domestic violence victims. Eg they may need to call their abuser to talk about child support payments. They shouldn't need to reveal too much information away, particularly if it could be used to find their address (eg a phone number)
I’ve never personally been involved in this type of situation, but it seems like if the relationship is such that there is a safety issue from information potentially slipping during a phone call, maybe the court should be dealing with that communication if there is an issue with child support payments not getting made.
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Anonymity and privacy are different things.
And anonymity against your interlocutor is usually a very bad thing. Even though there are a few exceptions.
I think what I would is a level playing field. If I get a call like that I cannot trace, I would expect that I should be able to do the same. If I am held to a standard that is not conducive to privacy, so should the person on the other side of that call.
But.. there is money on the line. Clearly, money from telemarketers/scammers/whoever is using this tech is enough to make telecoms hesitate from actually doing something about it.
Twilio had some strict policies introduced that I think were industry wise for USA. Basically all voip numbers had to go through thorough checks, which even our legitimate company failed (go figure). So as long as all companies like Twilio introduce those checks then spam calls should dramatically decrease. I thought it was already the case for USA?
It is maddening that the companies that provide the service appear to have thrown up their hands & pretend that they have no idea how they could possibly prevent spoofed numbers. Imagine if this was this easy to spoof IP #s. Perhaps it is.
I thought people's behavior these days was to ignore calls from numbers they don't know and let the phone screen it. I don't ever have problems with unknown numbers or SPAM calls on my Pixel
As in you never get spam calls, or you don't consider them a problem becausee you ignore them?
Because I get 2-3 a day on my Pixel and they annoy the poop out of me, even though I don't answer them.
I have my phone set to Dot Not Disturb except for explicit contacts
That's also the issue with swatting and fake calls to 911. When investigators trace it they'll hit a VOIP provider and it becomes near impossible to take it any further.
Be careful what you wish for. No reason why governments might decide they want the same thing for the Internet and domain names. Requiring a license to own domains… who are we kidding, they’d do it for the tax revenue.
I could easily see this jump. Reminds me how important it is to have tech literate representatives. Go vote!!
That's why carbon taxes will be a thing regardless of climate data. Why not have another source of revenue instead of reducing it?
> It seems like they're targeting the symptom instead of the problem.
I believe this is a quickly adopted band-aid in response to the recent political scam calls that pretended to be President Biden telling voters to skip voting in the primary.
It is going to be an interesting year.