Comment by reaperducer
1 month ago
The first time I ran into the concept of having my mobile phone data sold to a third-party was in 2003, when I went to the Czech Republic.
Right after I crossed the border from Austria, my U.S. cell phone started lighting up with spam SMS messages. At first, it was from the local cell phone carrier welcoming me to .cz. A few minutes later, a message from T-Mobile letting me know I was roaming in another new country. Then a few minutes after that, SMS spam for hotels, then restaurants, then casinos. All of this in a time before "smart" phones.
I'm not surprised to see it's gotten so much worse.
I flew to somewhere else in the US last month and I started getting political sms spam dependent on that location. It took a good two weeks after I got back for my sms spam to normalize.
Which state? Was it one of the 2024 battleground states (MI, PA, NC)?
And did those political SMSs honor opt-out requests or not?
Wait this is a thing now?
I assumed this was only based on voter registration party-spam.
That's awful.
A few years ago, I visited Detroit, and the next morning I received the messages from the Canadian (assuming Rogers) telecom welcoming to Canadia. I was spared the rest of the spam. Though it was the first time that I had ever considered the tech issues of being near a border and receiving multiple national signals like that must be a "fun" challenge.