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Killing Unwanted Text Messages from Yahoo! Alerts?

Creighti asks: "When I first got my new cellphone I immediately received several automated Text Message 'Alerts' from Yahoo and MSN which recurred on a daily basis. My guess was (is) that the previous owner of my cell phone number signed up for these things. Six months later I'm still getting unwanted text messages from Yahoo! Alerts. I managed to get rid of the MSN messages by signing up with MSN (gack), registering the phone number as mine, and de-selecting all text messages. I've tried the same trick with Yahoo. I've tried filling out the Yahoo! Help form that appeared to apply (interestingly enough, the Yahoo Help entry I've used several times to request they stop sending the unwanted alert appears to have been removed, but clicking the 'No' button on this page would work). I've even tried emailing abuse@yahoo.com. Anyone else getting text-message spammed by Yahoo! (or any other service)? Any suggestions for what I should do next to try and get Yahoo! to stop sending these unwanted messages?" Why aren't the text message preferences deleted when the cancellation notices comes thru?

150 of 388 comments (clear)

  1. I would... by SaturnTim · · Score: 4, Informative


    Send them a bill. They are using your airtime, with something you didn't ask for. If they don't want to pay the bill, they will find a way to stop it.

    --T

    --
    http://www.theMediaBunker.com
    1. Re:I would... by BrK · · Score: 5, Insightful

      I'm sure Yahoo! would happily ignore your bill. If you were lucky it *might* get posted on the bulletin board, next to the cafeteria menu for the week, as humor.

      Unless the cellphone number has been given out to a lot of people, I would just change it. It's the path of least resistance...

      --
      -This sig intentionally left blank
    2. Re:I would... by shepd · · Score: 3, Informative

      >I'm sure Yahoo! would happily ignore your bill.

      And this gives you cause to sue them in small claims court.

      If the amount of messaging exceeds $50-$100, it could be worth suing them in small claims. They probably won't even show up, and a decision will be reached (probably in your favour) in absentia.

      Of course, IANAL, so don't follow that as legal advice. :-)

      --
      If you could be told what you can see or read, then it follows that you could be told what to say or think - BoC
    3. Re:I would... by IdleTime · · Score: 3, Insightful

      Why don't you just call Yahoo, use the phone man! That's what they are for. Then traverse the hierarcy until you find the one responsible, but start at the top.

      Just call them each time you get a message, sooner or later they'll get tired.

      --
      If you mod me down, I *will* introduce you to my sister!
    4. Re:I would... by mr.+methane · · Score: 5, Insightful

      I had a similar problem with an on-line brokerage; I gave them my pager address so they could send trade confirmations, and ONLY trade confirmations. A few months later, I started getting pager spams at 2am, 3am, etc. from them. I called their customer service people, told them to stop, and they promised it would.

      When it started up a month or so later, I sent a registered letter to the CEO, calmly explaining that the first time is a mistake, the second time is harassment. I also filed complaints with the FCC, the NASD, the US attorney general, and their own attorney general.

      I got a polite, written response from a representative of the company explaining why the error occured, and also outlining the steps they were taking to make sure that it could not occur again.

      So... Be calm, be forgiving, and be factual. And then scream bloody murder.

    5. Re:I would... by BrK · · Score: 2

      >And this gives you cause to sue them in small claims court.

      Really? You can send anyone of your chossing a bill and then sue them just 'cause they didn't pay? How do you know you're even sending it to the proper accounts payable department?

      Granted that Yahoo! may in fact be causing this guys' cell phone bill to creap up $0.02 at a time (at least thats what text messages cost to my vzw phone), but I don't believe Yahoo is liable.

      They *should* however make it a fsck of a lot easier to get rid of these text messages.

      --
      -This sig intentionally left blank
    6. Re:I would... by Blkdeath · · Score: 3, Insightful
      Just call them each time you get a message, sooner or later they'll get tired.

      Uhm, yes and no. Speaking as someone who's recently had to deal with a Very Large Company who'd over-billed me (to the tune of $200 over four months), I can tell you that yes, perseverance will pay off. Not, however, because they get 'tired', but because eventually you'll speak to someone with reason, you'll speak calmly and plainly about the situation and they'll get you fixed up. It took me over a month of phone calls; level 1, 2, and 3 before I finally got a supervisor in the billing department who was kind enough to help me out. Now that I've received the cheque, I'll have to remember to write an appropriate letter of thanks. (My sister works in a call centre so I know they hear about things like that. So if someone goes the extra mile or even helps you when others won't - let them know! The guy might get a bonus or something out of it, and it'll certainly brighten their day.)

      --
      BD Phone Home!

      Shameless plug. Like you weren't expecting it.

    7. Re:I would... by sql*kitten · · Score: 2

      Send them a bill. They are using your airtime, with something you didn't ask for. If they don't want to pay the bill, they will find a way to stop it

      Hah, post to Slashdot, we'll flatten their server for you!!

      Oh, wait...

    8. Re:I would... by Amazing+Quantum+Man · · Score: 2

      Uh, dude? It's Yahoo!. I doubt that they'd even notice a slashdotting.

      --
      Fascism starts when the efficiency of the government becomes more important than the rights of the people.
    9. Re:I would... by avdp · · Score: 2

      You're wrong. On cell phone incoming calls always get deducted from your airtime (usually you sign up for a plan that give a certain amount of airtime a month).

      Of course, we're talking about SMS messages. Some carrier charge you a very small fee (i.e. $0.02) for each message, with possibly an allotment of free messages.

    10. Re:I would... by sjames · · Score: 2

      Really? You can send anyone of your chossing a bill and then sue them just 'cause they didn't pay? How do you know you're even sending it to the proper accounts payable department?

      Yes, you can. You will need to make a best effort to determine the appropriate address for their AP dept. Note that if you sue, you'd best be sure you had a legitimate reason for the billing, or they can sue you in return.

      In this case, there is a legitimate reason.

    11. Re:I would... by B.D.Mills · · Score: 5, Insightful

      I'm sure Yahoo! would happily ignore your bill

      IANAL. Check with a lawyer, but you'll probably find the following to be correct.

      Legally, they CAN'T ignore such a bill that you choose to send them.

      Under US law, it is ILLEGAL for Yahoo! to send unsolicited advertising messages to a mobile device, such as a pager and the like. You can bill them up to $500 for EACH MESSAGE. So if he sends them a bill, legally they MUST PAY.

      Send them a message via certified snail mail, return receipt requested, explaining that the owner of the phone number has changed, and demanding immediate removal of your phone's details from the database. Tell them that failure to comply by a certain date will result in them paying penalties of up to $500 per message sent to your mobile device.

      And if the messages don't stop, send them a bill for $350 for each message, with a warning that failure to pay by a certain will result in court action being taken against Yahoo! and $500 being payable for each message.

      --

      The only thing necessary for the triumph of evil is for good men to do nothing. - Edmund Burke
    12. Re:I would... by po_boy · · Score: 2
      Under US law, it is ILLEGAL for Yahoo! to send unsolicited advertising messages to a mobile device, such as a pager and the like. You can bill them up to $500 for EACH MESSAGE.

      Really, there's a federal law in place for that? Is that part of the same law that deals with fax spams or something? I've been looking for something like this for a while, but assumed that I would have to find a state statute for it. I'd love any information you can provide on this as my cursory searches have turned up nothing so far. Thanks.
    13. Re:I would... by sqlrob · · Score: 3, Informative

      Try here, for info about the TCPA. Basically, anything that reverse charges is illegal to send unsolicited messages to.

    14. Re:I would... by Muggins+the+Mad · · Score: 2

      > You get charged for incoming calls on all the major carriers, as far as I know.

      All the major carriers in the *US*, perhaps. There'd be an outrage if they tried that here (NZ). I believe they don't charge for incoming in Europe or Australia either.

      You really have to pay for incoming messages? In a country where spamming is rampant?

      Gosh.

      - MugginsM

    15. Re:I would... by jcr · · Score: 2

      Really? You can send anyone of your chossing a bill and then sue them just 'cause they didn't pay? How do you know you're even sending it to the proper accounts payable department?

      Of course you can. You can sue somebody for breathing your air, and you will get a hearing. Now, if you go to court with a frivolous case, the court can smack you but good for wasting the court's time, and/or the defense can move for dismissal.

      -jcr

      --
      The only title of honor that a tyrant can grant is "Enemy of the State."
    16. Re:I would... by glesga_kiss · · Score: 2
      may in fact be causing this guys' cell phone bill to creap up $0.02 at a time (at least thats what text messages cost to my vzw phone)

      you pay to receive a text message? That's a bit lame, is it standard where you are? Over here, the sender pays, end of story.

      Mind you, it would make it harder to resolve a case like this over here, without a provable monetry loss.

    17. Re:I would... by BrK · · Score: 2

      Yes, I for instance pay $0.02 per text message. For some amount of money, I can buy some pre-defined amount of messages, and for (I think) like $20.00US or something I can receive (and send) unlimited texts.

      If the *sender* had to pay, then of course this entire thread would never have had a need to exist :) Same thing for email, "SPAM" would be a problem if the sender actually incurred some fee for sending.

      One thing to note, though, is that if the *sender* had to pay, you probably wouldn't have these free services like the Yahoo and MSN alerts. Maybe that's not a Bad Thing after all, but it's worth pondering....

      --
      -This sig intentionally left blank
    18. Re:I would... by glesga_kiss · · Score: 2
      One thing to note, though, is that if the *sender* had to pay, you probably wouldn't have these free services like the Yahoo and MSN alerts.

      Most of Europe is sender-pay, and we do get these services. They are add-supported though, I'm not sure if you have to agree to getting adds messaged to you, but the web pages have the usual adverts on them.

      There are also some free web->SMS gateways out there, so essentially you get 100% free messaging if you have a net connection. Subject to the old "reasonable use" clause of course...

      It's the way it should be. Compared to a mobile phone call, the amount of data sent is tiny. To pay more per minute for text than phone is absurd, but that's the way the telcos like it!

      My costs are 10p (~15c) per text message and 2p per min (~3c) for voice.

  2. Contact your telco by dorward · · Score: 5, Insightful

    I suggest that instead of continuing to try to get Yahoo to stop sending the messages you instead contact your telephone company and ask them to block the messages before they get to your phone.

    As they are making money off you and Yahoo isn't, you are more likely to get a useful response.

    1. Re:Contact your telco by bbonnn · · Score: 4, Informative

      Actually, this is not an entirely uncommon issue with telcos ... theoretically, people can send unwanted Spam to SMS email gateways. For example, if your number is 650-555-1212 and your carrier is Cingular, you automatically have an SMS email address, which means that people can send you SMS messages from their email accounts. In Cingular's case, your SMS email address is 6505551212@XXXXXXX.XXXcingular.com. So, all a spammer has to do is send email messages to 6501111111@XXXXXXX.XXXcingular.com, 6501111112@XXXXXXX.XXXcingular.com, etc. Bingo, you get unwanted SMS on your phone

      Most carriers' response? Cancel SMS on your wireless account. Granted, you won't be able then to receive ANY SMS messages, but that's not their problem. Frustrating? Yes. Welcome to the world of wireless telco.

    2. Re:Contact your telco by rcw-work · · Score: 2
      A couple years ago I called Airtouch to request exactly that - something was sending an (apparently) automated numeric page to one of the new pagers we got.

      Airtouch's policy was that they couldn't stop it and they required a court order to tell me where they were coming from.

      We ended up changing the pager's number.

    3. Re:Contact your telco by gmack · · Score: 2

      I tried that once with Rogers-ATT after I quit my job (disagreement over an alliance with Ralsky) but forgot to remove myself from the paging system before I left. I felt pretty stupid when something broke a month later and they had no one who knew how to either fix it or change the number on the paging system.

      Roger's told me there was no possible way to block just one sender and I would have to either change my number or disable text messaging entirely.

    4. Re:Contact your telco by arnie_apesacrappin · · Score: 2
      I actually worked for a paging company one time, and we routinely had issues with this. Most of the time it was a fax machine that would get a hold of a pager number and keep retrying every five minutes until the sender realized that they had dialed the wrong number or the fax machine just gave up. The simplest solution was to change the pager number. Of course, that was easy for us as we were part of the paging company.

      In the case of pagers, the technology being used to accept incoming calls is generally very old. Some of the production equipment when I worked there was older than me. AFAIK, there was no way to block an incoming phone call on those units.

      And for the email gateway to the pagers, I wouldn't expect that your paging carrier could block incoming emails from a specific address either. The application that did the translation for us barely ran. The guy who wrote it seriously thought that if his code compiled without any errors that it was fine to move into production.

      --

      Still, with a plan, you only get the best you can imagine. I'd always hoped for something better than that. -CP

  3. Oops... by gUmbi · · Score: 5, Funny

    I didn't think of that...I feel sorry for the owners of my last 3 cellphone numbers.

  4. Talk to your carrier. by glrotate · · Score: 2

    Get them to block the originating #, or get them to change yours.

  5. Why don't the messages stop? by HaeMaker · · Score: 5, Informative

    Because these alerts are like a mailing list subscription and the phone number is like an email address. The problem is phone numbers are reused, where email addresses, generally, are not.

    Yahoo or MSN do not receive notification when someone cancels their phone account.

    1. Re:Why don't the messages stop? by rsteele19 · · Score: 2
      You would *think* email addresses would not be reused, wouldn't you? But when I signed up with a new ISP and set up my email account, I found I already had quite a bit of email, and none of it intended for me. After doing a little detective work I managed to track down the new email address of the rightful recipient and forwarded her messages to her until they stopped some months later.

      The moral of the story? If you're cancelling an email account and there's any chance someone might be emailing you something you wouldn't want someone else to recieve, make sure you get them your new email address!

      --

      This sig is umop apisdn.

    2. Re:Why don't the messages stop? by green1 · · Score: 2, Insightful

      >> Yahoo or MSN do not receive notification when someone cancels their phone account.

      yes and no... nobody tells yahhoo or MSN that the account is cancelled, but at the same time I know that most telcos (or at least the one I work for) have a policy that phone numbers must remain disconnected for a minimum of so many months before the next person gets that number (in our case I beleive it is 6 months)

      so while they won't get a message asking to cancel it, they should get a bunch of bounce messages if they are paging every day as was indicated by the orriginal poster. and I would think it would be reasonable (note I didn't say expected... I know better) to remove an address that has bounced every day for 6 months or more.

    3. Re:Why don't the messages stop? by WoodstockJeff · · Score: 3, Interesting
      However, YAHOO and MSN do get notifications when email addresses become invalid. MSN, so far, has been good about removing them.

      YAHOO, on the other hand, has consistantly bounced attempts to notify them that they are using invalid addresses for spam when sent to their "errors to" address, and so they continue to send spam to addresses that no longer exist. In fact, they continue to send spam to addresses that never existed in the first place!

      I suspect the only way to stop it is going to involve the legal system and court-ordered cash settlements... Or, an article in the Wall Street Journal about them, just before some important SEC filing!

  6. Hmm, not sure you've done this... by prostoalex · · Score: 5, Informative
    Have you tried this?

    Yahoo! Mobile Devices, log in under your Yahoo account and select "Add a New Device", then add your phone number, or e-mail for the cell phone, depending on what your operator supports and then specifically do not choose any alerts.

    1. Re:Hmm, not sure you've done this... by HelbaSluice · · Score: 5, Informative

      Not that simple. I had this same problem, and no matter what I tried, no "Yahoo Mobile Device" I created could ever grok that there was ALREADY a record in a database somewhere instructing them to SMSpam that same number on a daily basis.

      I successfully signed up for and then cancelled THE SAME MESSAGE SERVICE for my phone--and for the couple days it was active, successfully received two messages. My phone happily collapsed those into one message, with a "removing duplicates" warning.

      Whatever else is going on, Yahoo does NOT require that a "Mobile Device" have a unique phone number. Or at least, didn't at the time I was trying this.

      Fortunately, the volume of messages I was getting was nowhere near my monthly limit. I got pretty quick at ignoring them. A few months later they started getting inconsistent--skipping one or two days on occasion. Eventually they just petered out, and I haven't had one now in over a year.

  7. Preferences by vondo · · Score: 5, Interesting
    Why aren't the text message preferences deleted when the cancellation notices comes thru?


    Just a guess, but probably what is registered is an e-mail address like 3215551212@sprintpcs.com which is how e-mail can find its way to SprintPCS phones. The service you sign up for may have no relation to your cell provider, so cancelling one doesn't cancel the other and then your phone number (and hence e-mail address) can be recycled.

    1. Re:Preferences by Guppy06 · · Score: 3, Informative

      "but probably what is registered is an e-mail address like 3215551212@sprintpcs.com which is how e-mail can find its way to SprintPCS phones."

      Am I the only Sprint PCS customer that doesn't have an e-mail address like this? Mine has the same user name as my standard e-mail account and the phone number is only useful if you use Sprint PCS's web form to send a text message.

    2. Re:Preferences by vondo · · Score: 2

      I think I have both (but don't pay for the service, so don't get the mail).

      It may depend on how long you've been a customer. I think at some point they introduced the alphabetical names. I've been a subscriber for about 3 years, I guess.

      Try the numeric one and see if it works.

    3. Re:Preferences by dknj · · Score: 2

      sign up for wireless web (if you don't have pcs vision) and fire an email to yournumber@messaging.sprintpcs.com. tada instant paging. pcs vision, however, gives you whatever username you'd like

      -dk

  8. A *somewhat* related question... by Micah · · Score: 5, Insightful

    Ok, not about cell phone text, but about getting Yahoo to stop things...

    I have an *ancient* Geocities home page, that was set up before Yahoo acquired them. I am "yoderm" on Yahoo and was on Geocities before the acquisition. Unfortunately, the GC home page is not associated with my Yahoo account. I now have no way of logging into the thing, and really want it deleted.

    I've sent two messages through their "help" center, but no response. I've tried every support@ and help@ type e-mail I could think of for yahoo.com, geocities.com, and yahoo-inc.com. They all either bounce or get an automated reply that says "go to the help center".

    Conclusion: Yahoo goes WAY out of their way to avoid dealing with human "customers".

    1. Re:A *somewhat* related question... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2, Informative

      An automated daily/hourly/minutely/secondly email gently reminding them to remove you seems in order. I know the time I used this technique, I was successful at getting their attention, which is all I wanted.

    2. Re:A *somewhat* related question... by Archfeld · · Score: 2

      I had/have the same problem and to my knowledge there is NO WAY to get them to delete it. The only way I found was to upgrade to the new service, the free one that is and then delete my pages. This still left the broken link redirect but at least my content was gone...YAHOO blows all around.

      --
      errr....umm...*whooosh* *whoosh* Is this thing on ?
    3. Re:A *somewhat* related question... by John_Booty · · Score: 2

      I have an *ancient* Geocities home page, that was set up before Yahoo acquired them. I am "yoderm" on Yahoo and was on Geocities before the acquisition. Unfortunately, the GC home page is not associated with my Yahoo account. I now have no way of logging into the thing, and really want it deleted.

      That sucks. Not that you should have to jump through such hoops, but what if you try making the site a Terms Of Service violation? You could hammer it with wget to constantly exceed the bandwidth allocation, or maybe falsely say there's some sort of, I dunno... Nazi propaganda on there? I dunno, I don't know exactly what it takes to get a site kicked off of Geocities. Good luck. :P

      --

      OtakuBooty.com: Smart, funny, sexy nerds.
    4. Re:A *somewhat* related question... by secolactico · · Score: 2, Informative

      I had exactly the same problem, only I wasn't trying to delete my page. In the end, I just bought a domain and hosted my page somewhere else. I *was* going to host my domain with Yahoo, up that point.

      There's just no way to contact Yahoo customer service.

      --
      No sig
    5. Re:A *somewhat* related question... by rworne · · Score: 2

      Send a DMCA cease and desist letter against yourself and the provider. That ought to get them to stop rather quickly. There are plenty of examples on the net to purloin for your needs.

      --
      I tried every decent and legal way I could think of to resolve the issue w/the business before I rented the chicken suit
    6. Re:A *somewhat* related question... by rmohr02 · · Score: 2

      Well, from what I've seen, a site can exceed it's allocated bandwidth for each hour, but then it's refreshed each hour.

    7. Re:A *somewhat* related question... by BitHive · · Score: 2

      I have had GeoCities sites pulled within hours by claiming copyright violation. My old site, detonate.net, had many original movie parodies which became popular enough that people would mirror them on GeoCities and AngelFire. Dig up the appropriate email address, and send a polite but firm message that you do not appreciate your copyrighted material being reproduced (hosted) without your permission. Hopefully there's enough evidence to prove your ownership of the material, but chances are they won't check too thoroughly if the account has been dormant for long enough.

    8. Re:A *somewhat* related question... by Micah · · Score: 2

      wow. It recognized that user ID at least. Didn't know that, thanks. Unfortunately, the FTP password (and I haven't use it in years but I'm 98% sure it's correct) didn't work. :(

    9. Re:A *somewhat* related question... by Artifex · · Score: 2
      I have an *ancient* Geocities home page, that was set up before Yahoo acquired them. I am "yoderm" on Yahoo and was on Geocities before the acquisition. Unfortunately, the GC home page is not associated with my Yahoo account. I now have no way of logging into the thing, and really want it deleted.


      When my Geocities account was subsumed by Yahoo!, they added a .geo to the end of my name, because someone else had the same account name already on that service.

      Try logging in as yoderm.geo and your old password, etc. They were supposed to have sent you mail with that info, though, so if it doesn't work they changed it to something else. If they still had a search by "avenues" you could have checked the new name out that way, but, well, I think Yahoo! would be just as happy if all the Geocities pages disappeared.
      --
      Get off my launchpad!
    10. Re:A *somewhat* related question... by Micah · · Score: 2

      well NOW I do "have my own ISP" ... my own colocated server in fact. But a long time ago I put up a page that I simply want to take down now.

      And it's not like answering that will take a lot of their time. Sheesh. Should be do-able in 5 minutes.

  9. Sue - Its the American Way by csritchie · · Score: 5, Funny

    Go through your local fast food drive-thru, order a coffee and make sure you spill it on yourself as you are reading your messages. I'm pretty sure the warning labels on the coffee do not yet include: Warning! Do not drink while reading text messages.

  10. I have to remember that excuse by typical+geek · · Score: 4, Funny

    honest honey, all the porno text ads are from the previous owner of the cell phone.

    1. Re:I have to remember that excuse by Anonvmous+Coward · · Score: 5, Funny

      "honest honey, all the porno text ads are from the previous owner of the cell phone."

      "Then explain why you paid $400 for a phone with a color screen."

    2. Re:I have to remember that excuse by Anonvmous+Coward · · Score: 2

      "honest honey, all the porno text ads are from the previous owner of the cell phone."

      "Then explain why you paid $400 for a phone with a color screen."


      Off-topic my ass.

      I guess funny posts are automatically off topic unless you start it with "In Soviet Russia..."

    3. Re:I have to remember that excuse by T3kno · · Score: 2

      Umm...
      Try this!

      --
      (B) + (D) + (B) + (D) = (K) + (&)
  11. Re:Phone spam by Jucius+Maximus · · Score: 3, Informative
    "Just another reason NOT to get a fancy phone with internet abilities - Phone Spam."

    Sneakemail and other aliasing services can be used to avoid this as well. Instead of sending the mail to 5551234567@sms.phoneprovider.com you can send it to a sneakemail address which will bounce it to your SMS. This way you can kill off the sneakemail address if necessary and stop the spam easily.

  12. Yahoo support sucks :( by Flamesplash · · Score: 2

    I've found that Yahoo's support for free services really really sucks. I can see why, but I'm starting to doubt any support even exists for these services. Good luck, though I think you are screwed.

    --
    "Not knowing when the dawn will come, I open every door." - Emily Dickinson
  13. Cancellation Notice??? by kevlar · · Score: 3, Insightful

    Why aren't the text message preferences deleted when the cancellation notices comes thru?

    Yahoo essentially knows nothing about the phone number. All it knows is that there is a number (or more abstractly, an email address) through which it should send its junk. They don't know who/what/where otherwise. They know nothing about who currently owns which phone #.

    1. Re:Cancellation Notice??? by BrK · · Score: 2

      True 'dat

      Also keep in mind that most text messages are limited to an insanely small amount of characters, typ. 120-300. You think they want to waste "precious marketing space" with such frivolities as unsubscribe info?

      --
      -This sig intentionally left blank
  14. Putting an evil flip on the question... by frankie · · Score: 5, Interesting

    ...how easy is it to dick with people you don't like by registering their cell phone number with dozens of text alert sites? If these messages don't include a way to unsubscribe, they probably aren't confirmed opt-in either.

    1. Re:Putting an evil flip on the question... by chefmonkey · · Score: 5, Informative
      They are confirmed opt-in. When you first set up a mobile device, Yahoo sends it a message containing a unique password. You are required to type this password into a web page before it starts sending you alerts. So, you'd have to physically get your hands on someone else's phone to sign them up.

      Generally works pretty well, except when the phone number changes hands.

    2. Re:Putting an evil flip on the question... by exhilaration · · Score: 2
      I vaguely remember Yahoo sending an opt-in message to my phone with a code that had to be typed back into the website. They're not stupid, you know. :)

      A far easier method would be to up a shell script to continuously send interesting messages to $phoneno@$provider.com. I have yet to see any providers offer spam protection (but that might change if Euro-style SMS spam starts in the U.S.)

    3. Re:Putting an evil flip on the question... by dissy · · Score: 5, Interesting

      What I did is setup a forward on my machine so page-@domain forwards to my SMS address.

      I only give out the page-name address to people.

      This way i have full control via procmail on the filtering of who can and cant send to it and have it forwarded.

      Granted someone smart can realize its my phone number @whatever.carier.com (easy to find out the email gateway too) but it stops most idiots that would only know to use what i give them.

      Its also nicer as if i change phones or numbers, the address for my 'pager' never changes.

      What would be really nice is for the SMS gateway to have a setting so mail addressed TO the 'correct' adderss was denied, but mail addressed to my page-name adderss is allowed.
      Then I have 100% control over who pages me.

      Its also nice to have copys CC'd to my real email, so i do have access to full headers, and can archive them not on the phone.

      Just my $0.02

    4. Re:Putting an evil flip on the question... by asteinberg · · Score: 2

      A couple days ago, a friend of mine and I were discussing how easy it would be to piss someone off simply by adding a crontab job to send a short little e-mail to ??????????@mobile.att.net every few minutes. Of course, it would be incredibly obnoxious, but it's so easy it's scary! It seems that phone companies should give their users a way to block SMS messages from specific addresses.

      --
      The first ever Ultimate Frisbee video game: here (now
    5. Re:Putting an evil flip on the question... by quintessent · · Score: 2

      Hmmmm. Do spammers have mod points? Well, it's not surprising that the lowest form of life would infest Slashdot too.

  15. Re:Not to be a pain in the a**... by tomhudson · · Score: 3, Interesting
    Perhaps because:
    1. While the problem might be small now, it can only grow bigger in the future
    2. It's a slow newsday
    3. How often do you see yahoo-bashing on /.?
  16. The Key to Advertising by ch-chuck · · Score: 3, Insightful

    is 'circulation' - the reason those morons are so keen on keeping people on their 'hit' list is so they can go to their paying clients and say, "Look! You're message is reaching 250,000 potential customers". The more 'circulation' or ratings a paper, magazine or program has, the more they can charge for it. Nevermind the fact that 249,997 people have just associated $PRODUCT with annoying marketing tactics.

    --
    try { do() || do_not(); } catch (JediException err) { yoda(err); }
  17. Well it depends ... by SuperDuG · · Score: 2
    Personally I would call the cellphone company where you receive service from and change your freekin phone number.

    or turn off SMS

    I mean what the hell kinda question is this, did you even bother calling that CUSTOMER SERVICE line that is on your bill??

    --
    Ignore the "p2p is theft" trolls, they're just uninformed
  18. See if the Cell Phone provider has filtering tools by wnknisely · · Score: 5, Informative

    I have a cellphone with Verizon (and an associated vtext account for messages.) I tried signing up for weather alerts on my cellphone but found out quickly that the messages sent were too long to be useful.

    I was able to unsubscribe from the alerts - but even after I unsubscribed from the alerts, I kept receiving advertisements from the service sent to my cellphone.

    After a couple of unsucessful attempts to get it stopped I finally poked around on the Vtext site and found out that I was able to block a specified domain from sending to my cellphone.

    Blocking the domain of the weather alerts provider killed the spam as well.

    See if your provider doesn't let you filter out @yahoo.com messages.

    --
    In illa quae ultra sunt
  19. Same problem with timex messenger watch by smartin · · Score: 2

    I have the same problem with my watch. It was receiving messages before i signed up for the paging service and still gets them after i've signed up and have configured it under Yahoo! Alerts. My guess is that Yahoo has a separate ID for the watch and does not know that it should be associated with the phone number that skytel gave me.

    --
    The difference between Canada and the USA is that in Canada healthcare is a right and gun ownership is a privilege.
    1. Re:Same problem with timex messenger watch by smartin · · Score: 2

      My guess is that yahoo is sending them directly to the id of the watch and that they are different from regular pages as they don't cause it to vibrate and they show up with the little i icon.

      --
      The difference between Canada and the USA is that in Canada healthcare is a right and gun ownership is a privilege.
  20. Re:Well if it's with Sprint by tomhudson · · Score: 2
    But other providers charge $$$, either on an per-message basis, or for every message over a certain number per month.

    But that's not the point here. Even if you don't pay extra to receive spam, you still don't want it. Since he doesn't want these alerts, to him, they're spam.

    5 years ago, it was computer email spam. Today it's cell-phone spam. Who knows what it'll be in 5 years, or what the costs will be? Especially since some spammers are trying blocks of cell phone numbers.

  21. Re:Not to be a pain in the a**... by pspeed · · Score: 2, Offtopic

    Just wait, it will be posted again as top story in a few hours. ;)

    --
    Edu. sig-line: Choose rhymes with lose. Chose rhymes with goes. Loose rhymes with goose.
    Comparing? THEN use THAN.
  22. Re:Not to be a pain in the a**... by exhilaration · · Score: 5, Insightful
    Disable this category in your preferences and stop bothering us.

  23. Re:Well if it's with Sprint by exhilaration · · Score: 2
    Exactly, Voicestream's policy was that you could send/receive 10 SMS msgs per month, and an additional $2.95/month allowed you send/receive 200 per month.

    If you go over your quota, the cost was either 10 cents or 25 cents per message.

    I don't think that T-Mobile altered this policy.

  24. Re:Well if it's with Sprint by archeopterix · · Score: 2, Funny
    5 years ago, it was computer email spam. Today it's cell-phone spam. Who knows what it'll be in 5 years, or what the costs will be?
    Spammers spamming my internet-enabled fridge with free samples of spam?
  25. At least you got rid of MS by frovingslosh · · Score: 2

    Some idiot signed up for a passport account and gave them a dummy e-mail address that he just made up. Unfortunately it happens to be for a mailbox that I've used for years. The MS "welcome to .NEt passport" letter doesn't even give you an option to tell them that this address was subscribed in error and to take ou off their lists. I've tried sending e-mails to addresses of real people there, but everything has been ignored. I continue to get crap from them as a result of this bogus sign-up, and can't get rid of them.

    --
    I'm an American. I love this country and the freedoms that we used to have.
    1. Re:At least you got rid of MS by Osty · · Score: 3, Informative

      Some idiot signed up for a passport account and gave them a dummy e-mail address that he just made up. Unfortunately it happens to be for a mailbox that I've used for years. The MS "welcome to .NEt passport" letter doesn't even give you an option to tell them that this address was subscribed in error and to take ou off their lists. I've tried sending e-mails to addresses of real people there, but everything has been ignored. I continue to get crap from them as a result of this bogus sign-up, and can't get rid of them.

      What's the problem? The passport account is under your e-mail address, which means it's yours. Go to the Passport main site, follow the links to get the password for that account either mailed to you or reset (Follow the Member Services link, then "I forgot my password", follow the on-screen instructions), then login, go to Member Services, and close the account (the "Close my .NET Passport account" link). Done.

    2. Re:At least you got rid of MS by Rogerborg · · Score: 2

      postmaster@something.gov

      I try to spread it around. nsa.gov, fbi.gov, whitehouse.gov. Spread the love, people.

      --
      If you were blocking sigs, you wouldn't have to read this.
    3. Re:At least you got rid of MS by Nightpaw · · Score: 2

      I feel sorry for asdf@asdf.com.

    4. Re:At least you got rid of MS by Junta · · Score: 2

      A note to everyone out there doing this sort of thing. Use example.com, it can never be registered to a valid address and I've never seen an email address verification that rejects it.

      I always use some string @example.com

      If I have to see the email, I give them myemailaddress-randomstring@myrealdomain.com, and then put a .forward-randomstring in later to /dev/null. I have full control over my email server running postfix, so I can do whatever I want.

      Filling out random email addresses that could point to valid addresses not owned by you is not necessary.

      --
      XML is like violence. If it doesn't solve the problem, use more.
    5. Re:At least you got rid of MS by kesuki · · Score: 2

      That might have worked at one time. but now to 'retrieve' a forgotten password you have to know one or two of the following: Your forgotten password hint (usually from choices like mother's maiden name, pet's name, city of birth etc..) and if they have it things like your home mailing address, or bank account or credit card number, possibly your SSN.
      In the case of paypay, you need to know 2 + they will only send to the e-mail you set up when you knew the password. I'm not sure how much hotmail requires, but I know they have a 'password hint' at a minimum to be 'mailed' your replacement password.
      yup, you can be signed up for Hotmail/paypal/yahoo /ebay spam from any one and even though it's coming to your e-mail account you can't stop it, because you can't possibly know the password hints/personal information.

  26. A friend of mine has the exact same problem by swb · · Score: 5, Informative

    And he's not a dumbass, either. He's found his choices are (1) put up with the messages, (2) change phone numbers, or (3) disable text messaging (carrier phenomenon). 1 and 3 are free, 2 costs money (albeit not much).

    Why (4) get Yahoo! to! stop! it! please! isn't an option boils down to "they don't listen". It's one of those scary companies where there's no apparent way to actually *contact* anyone who can do something about this. There's no there, there so to speak.

    He has said that the wireless carrier was particularly unhelpful, which doesn't surprise me. I had a problem for a while when I got my first cellular with getting FAX calls. They offered to *sell* me caller ID (an expensive option on a limited range of AMPS equipment), but wouldn't do anything about tracking down who it was.

    I'm frankly surprised that there isn't more phone spam (how hard is it to figure out that all of a carrier's cell numbers are in NXX-5xx-xxxx?) or that message services don't build in a failsafe way to stop them, like adding a user-specfic hash code to every message and then have a web page where you can go, enter that hash, and disable that phone number's messaging.

  27. Here's what I do.. by _aa_ · · Score: 2

    This doesn't neccesarily apply to this exact situation, but it is related. I use SprintPCS. The SMS address that I am given is (for instance) 1234567890@messaging.sprintpcs.com. That's also my phone number. I think to myself, "I don't neccesarily want people who might SMS me to have my phone number, and I don't neccesarily want people who have my phone number to be able to SMS me." So my solution was to use my domain name (hosted by yahoo :O)) to make an email forwarder, Jared.2600@reack.com forwards to the 1234567890@messaging.sprintpcs.com. First, it's easier to remember. Second, I control it. If I start getting spam or unwanted messages, I can forward that email address to oblivion and make a new one. Also, if I do sign up for some sort of notification service, I can create a whole new forwarding address. Yahoo happens to offer unlimited email forwards with their domain name service, so I take advantage of that. I think most other domain hosts will do the same.

    1. Re:Here's what I do.. by avdp · · Score: 2

      That works most of the time. But there are two problems. You format of your SMS email is predictable. Even if you don't give it out, anyone that knows your cell phone number can go ahead and send you stuff. A second problem is with spammers that just send to random numbers.

  28. Cancelled? by FS · · Score: 2, Informative

    Why aren't the text message preferences deleted when the cancellation notices comes thru?

    Simple, those notification messages aren't in any way related to that phone. A user is unlikely to cancel his/her yahoo account just because they cancelled their phone service.

    It's obviously a problem, but definitely not an intentional one on Yahoo's part. An article like this on Slashdot is probably enough to get them to put up a page explaining how to get your number off someone else's account.

  29. TCPA violation? by russ-smith · · Score: 2, Informative

    If the called party is charged for the call they may have run afoul of the Telephone Consumer Protection Act of 1991 (47 USC 227 and the rules under 47 CFR 64.1200). If so you can sue them for up to $1,500 for each "call" just like a junk fax.

  30. Thats Yahoo. by dnoyeb · · Score: 4, Interesting

    That is complete BS but the same thing happened to me with email.

    This is the problem.

    1. Sign up for yahoo email.
    2. Register an alternate email address of someone you don't like.
    3. sign up the alternate address for all kinds of junk.

    Their is no way they can cancel it. Yahoo will do what they always do when you email them for help, flush it down the toilet, or threaten YOU for spamming them...

  31. Pre-spammed accounts... by writermike · · Score: 2

    I agree with some of the other posts here. You'll likely have to take this up with the phone service provider, NOT Yahoo!. I suppose if I just got the phone number, I'd demand a new one. I realize that this isn't always possible or ideal, but it's the sure way to get away from it all.

    I've seen similar things happen to folks who sign up with larger ISPs. Recently one signed up with RCN, got an "available" e-mail address, connected for the first time only to find 50+ spams inside from various companies.

    I think we're doomed to see this more and more as ISPs/phoneservice providers run out of name/numberspace. Recycling will happen. What can the providers do if the e-mail/phonemail address is out there already? Even if they close the number of X number of months, the spammers will still pump out ads at the address.

    --
    If Nalgene water bottles are outlawed, only outlaws will have Nalgene water bottles.
  32. Use the PHONE. Speak with a PERSON. by bluephone · · Score: 4, Informative
    In this age of email, web forms, IM, SMS, VoiceMail, yada yada yada, we overlook the simple telephone. I had a problem with Yahoo a few years ago, and after goign round robin with the electronic options, I picked up the phone, called teir corporate offices, and didn't stop uotil I got to someone who helped me get the problem straightened out. It took 2 days to get it done that way, versus a month of web-based frustration.

    1-408-731-3300

    --
    jX [ Make everything as simple as possible, but no simpler. - Einstein ]
  33. Standard OSS response by exhilaration · · Score: 2
    If you don't like Yahoo, start YOUR OWN portal/webmail/community system.

    All you need is broadband a box running Linux. Horde has pretty much everything you'd need, and there's plenty of free stuff out there to make up for any shortcomings.

    I'm running Horde off my cable connection - they block port 80 but I don't care because I do everything via SSL anyway.

    And in the process you'll learn a hell of a lot about networking and Linux.

  34. While not Yahoo alerts... by stubear · · Score: 2

    ...I keep getting RH Network alerts in my e-mail inbox even though I no longer use RedHat. I've tried to unsubscribe on the RedHat site but it keeps resetting my preferences to "send e-mail to...". I've tried asking politely to have redhat support to remove my e-mail address from their list and/or kill the RHN account. I've threatened them with lawsuits under anti-spam laws (by the way, I knew this would not work if they called my bluff. I had no intention of pursuing legal action, I had only hoped that the possibility of legal action might get someone's attntion). Nothing, nada, zip. I keep getting their alerts and I can't get off the list no matter how hard I try. Why don't poeple think about these things when they design their systems?

  35. So does this actually work? by marlowe · · Score: 2

    What if you get a ruling in your favor, and they just decide to ignore it? How do you collect your money?

    --
    http://www.angelfire.com/ca3/marlowe Better a smartass than a dumbass.
    1. Re:So does this actually work? by Blkdeath · · Score: 3, Informative
      What if you get a ruling in your favor, and they just decide to ignore it? How do you collect your money?

      I can't tell if you're trolling, or if you're really this dense.

      See, Small Claims COURT is a court of LAW ; judgements made there must be carried out and paid in full, else the guilty will face federal charges.

      Yeesh.. Do they let just anybody come here or what?

      --
      BD Phone Home!

      Shameless plug. Like you weren't expecting it.

    2. Re:So does this actually work? by llamaluvr · · Score: 2, Interesting

      I worked in a municipal court over the summer. I watched a lot of people not get their money in small claims court.

      Now, if you win against somebody like Yahoo!, then you're probably pretty safe. They're a big target, and they're not particularly likely or able to hide themselves, and they probably won't go bankrupt due to a small claims suit. However, while getting a default judgement is relatively easy (it's your proof against them not showing up), it can be very difficult to track people to get them to pay. Often, people who get evicted move out and don't leave an address or number, or businesses who get sued simply "disappear", and there's no contact avaialbe for the person who ran the business. Once they find an personal address or place of employment or the place where they bank, they can garnish wages or accounts, or serve them for a debtors exam, where they would reveal all their assets.

      The bottom line is, once you get a judgement in your favor, it's not as easy as you think to get your money.

      --
      Insightful: 76, Off-Topic: 379, Flamebait: 24, Funny: 152, Interesting: 201, Underrated: 55, Troll: 9, Total: 896
    3. Re:So does this actually work? by gandy909 · · Score: 2, Informative

      Not quite that at all. Although IANAL, I have been working in a Court for the past 13 years now and I can tell you with some degree of certainty that "getting a Judgment" from the Court does NOT get you your money/property/etc. i.e. the Court does not "go get it" for you... YOU have to do ALL the work. What that Judgment from Small Claims Court does do though (depending on what state you/other party live in) is give you the legal authority to place liens on the other party's property, bank accounts, etc., and do other things like garnish the other party's wages for up to the amount of the Judgment. There are lots of sticky problems to contend with though. For example, in some, or maybe all, states if the property or account is jointly owned you are out of luck trying to attach the lien or account, etc, etc.

      --

      (Stolen sig) Remember: it's a "Microsoft virus", not an "email virus", a "Microsoft worm", not a "computer worm
    4. Re:So does this actually work? by Ooblek · · Score: 5, Informative
      My, you are full of yourself to call someone dense when you obviously have never gone through the process yourself.

      To add to the previous respondents that also said you're wrong, I can give an example of what happens in small claims. My brother went through this and it took him a year to collect his money.

      An established nursery business with several locations in a particular city in Oklahoma let one of their unlicensed, illegal immigrant workers drive one of their spare cars. This guy came barreling down the road, over the hill, and realized he was going too fast to avoid hitting the car that had stopped at the light in front of him. He swerved into oncoming traffic and nailed my brother head on as he was waiting in the oncoming turn lane. Police came, arrested illegal immigrant for no license and no insurance. My brothers car needed major work, and he only had liability as he had just paid it off a month before.

      Nursery came and bailed the guy out of jail. The nursery claimed they had sold the car to the guy, and "We're not responsible." My brother went to the DMV and had to pay to get the ownership records himself, as proof that they were the registered owners. He had to pay to file the claim in small claims court. He had to pay to have them served with a summons. They didn't show up to court, so he won. He sent them several letters, never got an acknowledgement or a dime from them.

      He went back to court a few months later with delivery receipts of the letters he had sent. He had to buy something from the nursery with a check so that he could figure out where their bank account was and what the number was. Once he had this information, he ask the court for a garnishment. It was granted, he went to the bank, and got about half of what he was owed because they didn't have enough in the account to cover the full amount. Another round of registered letters, another trip back to court, another garnishment, and he finally got to their bank account at a time when they had enough money to cover what he was owed and all the additional costs he had accrued trying to collect the money.

      This is the same wherever you go, and it even will work in your favor if you get sued. Just don't pay, and it can take months or years for them to get the money out of you, if they ever get it. Now, there is of course no guarentee you won't eventually piss some judge off and have a warrant issued for you.

    5. Re:So does this actually work? by Blkdeath · · Score: 3, Insightful
      To add to the previous respondents that also said you're wrong, I can give an example of what happens in small claims. My brother went through this and it took him a year to collect his money.

      Wow.. Can you add any more variables to that case? Illegal immigrant, no license, nursery without sufficient funds to cover costs, ...

      I never said it would be a one-day, zero expense endeavour, but it certainly doesn't involve a Columbo-esque plot or a potential international incident.

      Moreover; press attention would do wonders for this case. Yahoo! doesn't want their name smeared rightly across the headlines for something they could settle for $200. In all likelyhood they'd pay the money to get rid of you. They'll waste large amounts of legal funding on cases that matter.

      --
      BD Phone Home!

      Shameless plug. Like you weren't expecting it.

    6. Re:So does this actually work? by Mitreya · · Score: 2
      Ehm, moderators? How is this offtopic? I find it quite relevant to the discussion.

      As far as Ooblek's brother -- this is the determination that I tend to admire. I think such persistent people may improve things in our world. Few people who screw others come to understand that screwing people is bad.. only if they are taught in a hard way. If he sued the nursery for 1M dollars it would have been even more effective...

      Please mod the parent up.

  36. Profit! by limekiller4 · · Score: 5, Interesting
    This is simple. And yes, I'm dead serious.

    1. Contact Yahoo through a reasonable contact (abuse@yahoo.com should be fine, though legal@ wouldn't hurt either), letting them know your efforts to remove your name using their controls.
    2. Inform them that you'll give them a 10-day grace period to correct this.
    3. Also inform them that you have a great new service of your own; proofreading!
    4. Also inform them that if they wish to continue sending you messages, you will be more than happy to proofread them and bill them at a rate of nnn.nn per message. Let them know that your offer is opt-in; if they wish to participate, they can simply send you another message.
    5. Let them know you bill on a net-30 basis.
    6. Find out the names and email contact points for their board of directors.
    7. Each time they opt-in by way of another message, bill them and cc their board of directors. Actually billing them is the crucial point but this can be accomplished fairly easily.
    8. Profit!

    Trust me. You won't be on that list for long. If you are, take a trip to your friendly neighborhood court and file for a small claims case. Then you're talking settlement.

    --
    My .02,
    Limekiller
    1. Re:Profit! by B.D.Mills · · Score: 4, Informative

      It's even easier than that.

      IANAL.

      By sending unsolicited advertisements, Yahoo! are breaking the c.1991 law that says it is illegal to send unsolicited advertisements to a mobile device.

      A mobile phone is a mobile device.

      And you can make them pay up to $500 per message.

      --

      The only thing necessary for the triumph of evil is for good men to do nothing. - Edmund Burke
    2. Re:Profit! by SirWhoopass · · Score: 3, Interesting

      I'd love to believe this, but it sounds like this is an "opt-in" service that he can't get out of. You'd probably need to send them a registered letter first, indicating that you wish to opt-out of the service. If that is ignored, then you've got some documentation that you can take to court.

    3. Re:Profit! by Chagrin · · Score: 2

      Ahh that's crap. Check your state's laws: you likely have legal recourse to sue in the event that the messages continue. Are you charged per text message? It's just like receiving unsolicited faxes (which we know is illegal).

      Send certified mail to their legal department and ask them to stop sending the messages. If they fail to stop the messages, take them to small claims court.

      --

      I/O Error G-17: Aborting Installation

  37. answer: copyright violation by donutz · · Score: 5, Informative

    I had an old geocities account that didn't get converted to my yahoo account, and after months of unsuccessful attempts to get the darn thing cancelled, I wrote a letter to the Yahoo person in charge of copyright violations, and explained that Yahoo was violating my copyright to the works posted on that old geocities account. Effectively, by limiting my ability to control the distribution of my copyrighted works, they were violating my copyrights. Not that I wanted to sue or anything, I just wanted those pages gone.

    Not long after, that account disappeared, and I was happy.

    1. Re:answer: copyright violation by xyote · · Score: 2, Interesting

      That should work. Send them a DMCA violation notice. That would force them to take it off.

  38. Not a solution by Andy+Dodd · · Score: 2

    Unless you can config your phone to ONLY accept incoming messages forwarded via sneakemail, this won't help the user one bit - This spam will simply bypass the sneakemail account and go right to his phone.

    Yes, it's a useful way to give out an SMS contact address without giving out your phone's direct address, which you can revoke if it starts receiving spam. But once spam starts coming directly to the phone, you're screwed.

    And it's not the user's fault in this case - He didn't do anything to sign up for these spams, it happens that he has inherited the spam that a former user (to whom it was likely not spam) had.

    --
    retrorocket.o not found, launch anyway?
  39. another option by exhilaration · · Score: 3, Informative

    (Using Windows...) Install Outlook 2k or higher to download your Hotmail messages to your local machine. Install CloudMark and say goodbye to 99% of your spam. This will also remove any space limits imposed by Hotmail, as your mail will now be sitting on your own hard drive.

    1. Re:another option by exhilaration · · Score: 2
      Posting AC so I can mod you up--I had no idea that Outlook (other than OE) could do that. Thanks!

      I didn't think it was possible until one of my friends proved me wrong by doing it. My sister is always at 98% or 99% disk usage on Hotmail, so I installed Outlook on her PC to let her download her messages. It worked, much to my surprise.

      When Microsoft acquired Hotmail they probably immediately started working on integrating it into Windows and Office.

    2. Re:another option by benzapp · · Score: 2

      I hope someone else can try this. I just downloaded this software and it works correctly for email that comes through a regular POP server, but it has no effect on hotmail. I figured as much because filters do not work on hotmail folders either. Now, perhaps I am doing something wrong, but the software works exactly like any other filter. You mark an email by hitting a block button and it moves it to a spam folder. In fact, it creates a spam folder for you.

      --
      I don't read or respond to AC posts
    3. Re:another option by cuyler · · Score: 2

      I get NO spam on my hotmail account and I've had it for over 3 years now. Of course, every address that as the '@' symbol in it are automatically thrown into the trash.

      I only use the account for MSN.

  40. Court by nuggz · · Score: 3, Informative

    Really? You can send anyone of your chossing a bill and then sue them just 'cause they didn't pay? How do you know you're even sending it to the proper accounts payable department?

    Yes you can sue anyone for not paying a bill.
    In court they can just argue they're not the right person. That is why we have small claims court, to facilitate small claims cheaply and easily for all 3 parties. (You, them and the gov)

    1. Re:Court by _ph1ux_ · · Score: 2

      yes and this system is abused.

      I recently got sued by a housekeeper who I stopped using in 2000. They sent me a subpeona after a year and a half claiming I owed them money.

      Their "bill" was just some cells from excel pasted into a word letter and printed.

      I went to the wrong court the first time, and automatically lost. then they issued a warrant for my arrest and then the guy subpeona'd me again claiming more money was owed.

      I went and he didnt show. since I had to post a bail on the warrant so they wouldnt make me stay in jail over night, they judged that the warrant post satisfied the claim and it was dropped.

      This is how small claims court get abused - and it happens very often due to the small amounts of money, so they dont do anything about it.

      If I see this guy on the street - he will have some hefty hospital bills.

      dont ever use Molly Maids as a house cleaning service.

  41. Re:Phone spam by Doc+Hopper · · Score: 2

    That's what I set up at work. We have those same type of numbers -- 5555551212@mobile.att.net -- so we just set up email aliases on our mail server, so when someone sends a mail to "page-soandso@domain.com" it goes to their pager. Very useful, and if a phone ever starts getting spam, we just change the email address or remove it. Makes it so we can recycle our phones to new people easily.

    You can even do this easily at home using any standard mailer and a mail alias file. Just point a domain at your home DSL link (or whatever you use), and put the entry into your "aliases" file. Even if you use Fetchmail to retrieve mail from a remote account, you can make it so that those remote accounts can eventually go to a pager address. Fun fun fun :)

  42. umm.... by exhilaration · · Score: 2

    What the hell would that accomplish? The spam is being sent to a phone number, which is tied to the SIM card. You can swap phones a hundred times but those SMS messages will follow you as long as your phone doesn't change.

    1. Re:umm.... by bluephone · · Score: 2

      No no, the guy who would have had the phone number originally would still have it, and this new guy wouldn't have the problem of getting spam meant for the old owner.

      --
      jX [ Make everything as simple as possible, but no simpler. - Einstein ]
    2. Re:umm.... by exhilaration · · Score: 2

      Correction: ...as long as your phone number doesn't change.

    3. Re:umm.... by exhilaration · · Score: 2
      oh i see - i thought you were suggesting a solution for this guy

      my bad yo

  43. Re:Phone spam by Blkdeath · · Score: 2
    Just another reason NOT to get a fancy phone with internet abilities - Phone Spam.

    Nahh.. I've got a nice new phone from Telus which supports 1X, SMS, two-way text messaging and all the other cruft; but I didn't get it because of that, I got it despite all of those features. I couldn't care less about surfing the WWW or reading e-mail on this small screen (small for a computing device, large for a cellphone). I got the phone because it was inexpensive and came with four months' of free airtime and an additional $100 credit towards my bill for a very low rate ($129.99 plus tax) and free activation. When I activated the phone, I simply told the girl not to add any web/text features - period. If I do decide later down the road that I want (some of) them I'll have the option. I like having choice, and eliminating all the phones that are web, 1X, or text-message ready severely reduces my choice (to almost nothing; most new digital phones nowadays are capable of all these features)

    --
    BD Phone Home!

    Shameless plug. Like you weren't expecting it.

  44. Tmobile incomings by rosewood · · Score: 2

    Recently Ive been receiving a shitload of wap push messages via tmobile (USA) and they are all giberish. Tmobile just tells me TS and last month they damn near sent me over the 300.

  45. been there, done that by frovingslosh · · Score: 2

    The page you speak of wants information like my state and zip code (and I don't know what the idiot used). There is a "I forgot my password" link that claims they will mail you a new password without this info, but this is the one piece of e-mail that I never seem to get from them. I tried again today, but they will not send it!

    --
    I'm an American. I love this country and the freedoms that we used to have.
  46. This is almost as annoying as... by phorm · · Score: 2

    Getting the old fax number of a Chinese businessman. I used to get continual faxes to my land-line at about 2-3am... try were traced to China.

    Spam is annoying in your inbox, when it makes it to your phone it is ten times the annoyance. Shouldn't they mandate a block/allow list for cellphones, since (on many plans) it's a pay-per service. i.e. with my local carrier, it's $0.10 for text message unless you subscribe to the service.
    More recently, they allowed users to be exempt from either the service subscription or the per-use payments... but it's still annoying to have so little control over your phone email - especially once spammers decide to start hitting random 1235555555@text.mycellphoneprovider.com

  47. Your state may have an applicable law... by meara · · Score: 2, Informative

    Depending on where you live, you may be able to sue to recoup airtime costs. For example, California has passed an anti-mobile-spam law.

    Unfortunately, unless you're bored and otherwise unemployed, this is hardly worth the while.

  48. Re:Not to be a pain in the a**... by Zerbey · · Score: 3, Insightful

    But what is this doing on the front page? This is something you ask a smaller specialized forum, not the slashdot community. I can hardly see how this will generate meaningful or intellectual discussion, and I can definitely not see how this is news for nerds or stuff that matters.

    1. Because most geeks own cell phones
    2. Because most geeks have an interest in wireless communications
    3. Because most geeks have an interest in stopping spam

    In addition, I think the discussion thus far has been very interesting. If it bothers you, you can filter it out in the preferences.

  49. Speaking of email to phones.... by raehl · · Score: 5, Funny

    Does anyone have Alan Rasky's cell phone number?

    I have a couple really good deals on Viagra and Penis Enlargement to pass on.

    1. Re:Speaking of email to phones.... by windex · · Score: 2

      On behalf of:

      Christopher Raehl
      1133 Industrial Blvd
      Chippewa Falls, WI 54729
      (715) 720-9131

      I would like to remind everyone to stop feeding the trolls.

      Thank you.

  50. Yahoo Text Messages are Per Account by fraudrogic · · Score: 2, Insightful

    I use the Yahoo text messaging for once a month reminders (give dog meds, hair cut, wife ovulating,etc..) I'm not sure you can create a yahoo account to discontinue the messages since the messages are probably created by your cell number's predecessor's Yahoo account.

    Does Yahoo even have access to this kind of information? "Yeah, can you guys look up my cell phone number among your thousands of subscribers and modify that subscribers text messenging preferences?" That sounds like a nightmare of a problem.

    I suggest changing your Cell Phone number. That's your easiest solution.

    --
    I only mod up parents of "mod parent up" posts...
  51. I feel so guilty. by Unknown+Poltroon · · Score: 4, Funny

    youre bob@bob.com, areny you?!? You poor spam buried bastard, ive been using that as a throwaway address for years.

    --
    All Troll + "offtopic" mods are meta moderated as "Unfair", because you abused the system.
    1. Re:I feel so guilty. by Duckz · · Score: 2

      I was notvalid@address.com; I opted to abandon the mailbox after a while, something about too many companies thinking I was Joe Blow and several other generic names didn't please me.
      --
      Todd

  52. You can't get out of Yahoo by donutello · · Score: 2

    A few years ago (not sure what I was thinking) I registered for a Yahoo! account. Of course, I wouldn't tell the scumbags my real DOB or zip code. Later I forgot about this account.

    A few months ago Yahoo changed their spam policy to opt-out. Suddenly I started getting junk mail in my regular account. I tried to login to the Yahoo account to change the settings but couldn't since I forgot my password. I couldn't use the online thing to get a new password since it required my DOB and zip code to do that.

    After several attempts at trying to sort it out with Yahoos customer disservice, I arrived at the following conclusions:
    - I could not change the spam policy without signing in.
    - They would not stop sending me junk mail to my regular email account without signing in.
    - They would not delete the account unless I could prove it was me - having the same name and access to the email account registered for the account did not count.
    - They would not give me the password to my account or change it.

    I ended up just dumping the email account and starting afresh. Luckily, it was not one I used heavily.

    --
    Mmmm.. Donuts
  53. bubba.com by Unknown+Poltroon · · Score: 2

    one of my instructors used this ans an example for a class for the whole semester, untill someone pointed out that bubba.com existed, and was full of tateful pictures of neekid women.

    --
    All Troll + "offtopic" mods are meta moderated as "Unfair", because you abused the system.
  54. Staples spams, and like Yahoo won't stop... by Spoing · · Score: 2
    My domain has recieved fresh spam from them on a regular basis. Givning Staples the benifit of the doubt -- the accounts spammed are test accounts -- I've contacted them a couple different ways telling them to stop. Unfortunately, I've contacted them about once a month for the last 6 months, each time they apoligize and each time they say that my domain won't recieve any more solicitiations...only that it may take 4-6 weeks for the request to process.

    No more. If I recieve a single spam from them in 2003, they will be reported to all the anti-spam services I already use. F-em!

    --
    A firewall can not protect you from yourself. Turn off what you do not need. Do not use the firewall to do your work.
  55. Tech support number for Yahoo by Mitchell+Mebane · · Score: 5, Informative

    /me pulls up his super-secret list of contact numbers

    Ah, here we go. Give Yahoo a call at 1-408-349-3300. Took me a while to find that number, but it actually works.

    --

    The roots of education are bitter, but the fruit is sweet.
    --Aristotle
  56. Change your e-mail address if possible by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Funny

    I used to get a lot of important e-mail from the folks at Microsoft telling me about their wonderful products. After making several unsuccessful attempts to get off their mailing list, I finally changed my profile and set my e-mail address to postmaster@microsoft.com. Worked like a charm.

    ---insert signature line here---

  57. simple solution by Kunta+Kinte · · Score: 4, Informative

    disable SMS for a short while.

    Most mailing list unsubscribe you if your messages bounce for some limit.

    Inconveniet yes, but it should work.

    --
    Based on upvotes, Ageism is the only "-ism" Slashdotters care about and think isn't SJW
    1. Re:simple solution by zbuffered · · Score: 2

      Probably not -- before he got the number, it was likely not used for some time, during which countless SMS messages must've bounced off of the server. Result? Still getting SMS Spam. It's possible they re-assigned the number right away, but my bet is that it was bouncing SMS for at least a week or so.

      --
      Synergy is your friend
    2. Re:simple solution by Ben+Hutchings · · Score: 2

      In theory, by requesting delivery notifications one can find out whether an SMS got delivered. In practice, undeliverable SMSs silently disappear into a black hole.

  58. This is why I want to own a phone number. by Mustang+Matt · · Score: 2

    I wish I could purchase my phone number for life.

    I know there are some services out there that do this, but they don't cover my area code.

    Then I could freely switch from provider to provider without losing my number.

    --
    The man who trades freedom for security does not deserve nor will he ever receive either. - Benjamin Franklin
  59. What to do by Eric+Smith · · Score: 3, Informative
    Any suggestions for what I should do next to try and get Yahoo! to stop sending these unwanted messages?
    Sue them in small claims court for a few hundred dollars. They'll probably settle and pay you off, but if they keep sending you the unwanted messages, you can just keep suing them and collecting money from them.

    IANAL, so I don't really know how well this will work.

  60. Re:My problem is just the opposite by hatless · · Score: 2

    It's December. How many pro baseball scores do you expect to get in December?

  61. How I get results by complaining - a guide by Wiseleo · · Score: 5, Informative

    I routinely handle complaints on behalf of my customers with their vendors. Some vendors, such as Verio, are beyond awful to work with based on my experience. Some vendors know me by name if enough of my clients have issues with them :-). I will outline my techniques for the common benefit of the readers.

    My typical procedure (first week):

    1. Contact first level personnel for about 3 days and gather employee IDs and case numbers.
    2. Cease talking with first level and skip directly to first level supervisors confronting them with evidence. Do so for 1 day, on the 3rd day with at least 2 calls documenting the supervisor employee ID and case numbers.
    3. Cease talking with supervisors and skip directly to second level supervisors. Do so for 1 day similar to 1st level.
    4. Advise the second level supervisor that if the problem is not handled within the next 24 hours (the 5th day), the next directive will be received from his manager, ignore the laughter if any insues.
    5. Follow up the next day (by then you should have a direct line) and remind him that the problem still exists.

    Begin corporate level follow ups as follows (second week, generally 2 to 3 days):

    1. Look up the company's corporate records for the following:
    a) The front desk phone number
    b) The Investor Relations (or any other PR function) - optional, never used it
    c) The legal counsel of the company - optional, never used it
    d) The company's mailing address for the HQ
    2. Contact the front desk and ask to be transferred to the Office of the President/CEO. It's really none of their business to know why, but be candid and polite.
    3. Believe it or not, most of the time you will in fact reach the executive assistant or someone whose job is specifically to resolve stretched out problems. Once you reach that person, obtain their direct number, e-mail, fax, and mailing address. Be prepared to send a ton of evidence of wrongdoing. The people at the top generally will have the organization chart available and know the executive in charge of that particular part of the company.
    4. If you are lucky, and most of the time you won't be, you'll be given contact information for that particular executive. The executives are extremely busy people, so you'll likely talk to his assistant instead. Most of the time, however, it's not really necessary.
    5. Be prepared for very different treatment the next time you call the customer service department as your name will be quite well known around the company. A simple memo from about 4-5 management levels down advising on how to deal with your problem carries infinitely more weight than any insult you can come up with.

    Yes, I get results fast and this kind of work generally costs the client about $1200 or so. In fact, I once got a Nortel Regional VP in charge of my area to contact me within literally 40 minutes of me reaching just the front desk at Nortel to resolve a vendor issue. The vendor subsequently lost their authorization from Nortel.

    Does this sound like overkill? Try to call Yahoo front desk, ask for Office of CEO, and present your case. Internal pressure is very effective.

    Oh yeah, the mailing address is for the thank you letter along with hard copies of the evidence.

    Enjoy!

    --
    Leonid S. Knyshov
    Find me on Quora :)
  62. 8. Profit?? Dude, This Is Slashdot! by Myriad · · Score: 2
    8. Profit!

    Step eight is proft? Eight?!? Sorry dude, this is Slashdot... until you can break that down to a four step program it'll never fly!

    --
    "They do not preach that their god will rouse them, a little before the Nuts work loose." Kipling, 'The Sons of Martha'
  63. I Kept Getting SMS from a National Football Team by AShocka · · Score: 2, Funny

    to show up to training for their squad. I never knew they were so desperate for the services of an overweight late 40's something. It went on for months. They even rang, but I ignored them, they just couldn't afford me.

  64. On a related note... by Wonko42 · · Score: 2

    On a somewhat related note, if you're the guy who keeps calling my cell phone at 4am and asking, in a slurred voice, if you can speak to Jared, please stop. I mean it. I'm not Jared and I don't know Jared, and even if I was Jared I would kill you for waking me up at 4am.

  65. Comment removed by account_deleted · · Score: 3, Funny

    Comment removed based on user account deletion

  66. Verizon has a spam filter by zehn · · Score: 2, Informative

    If your phone service is with Verizon then go to http://www.vtext.com and under personalization there is a tab for message blocking in which you can block either a specific address or an entire domain.

  67. Related question by Kaz+Riprock · · Score: 2


    I have a cell phone number that must have *just* been reassigned, because I am still getting a ton of calls from numbers that I have no idea who they are. I called a few of them back at the beginning to bitch at the people who were calling "my" number...but most caller IDs were the operator level number of some companies that must have been in contact with the person who previously had my phone...and those operators were WHOLLY unsympathetic.

    So, how do I get this to stop? I have a call screening function, but it uses a minute of my airtime to pick up the phone and tell them it's not the old person's number anymore. If I turn it over to my voicemail, I have to wait and see if it was someone important (at a number i didn't recognize) and if they left me a message.

    Any ideas?

    --
    Mordor...a magical, mythical land where women are more rare than dragons--but where every man would rather find a dragon
  68. If you are having rrouble with any business by IBitOBear · · Score: 2

    Look at complaining to FTC.gov (obviously if you are a US citizen only 8-). Go to "Consumer Protection" and there are several forms that may apply. The FTC can really work. Yahoo is big business and involved in stealing your money (those messages use up your money or your minutes etc.) so it is Trade Comission business.

    My roommate ended up costing Bank Of America a $60,000(US) fine for holding a certified check.

    There are petty buraucrats out there waiting to help...

    --
    Innocent people shouldn't be forced to pay for inferior software development.
    --"Code Complete" Microsoft Press
  69. Better Business Bureau by Spazmania · · Score: 2

    File a complaint with the Better Business Bureau. Its easy, its free, and they make sure it gets the attention of the right person at the company in question. With such a trivial complaint coming from the BBB, Yahoo'll take care of the problem faster than greased lightning.

    --
    Moderating "-1, Disagree" is simple censorship. Have the guts to post your opinion.
  70. CHA CHING! by gnovos · · Score: 2

    So, you remembering to are store them, right? At your $150 per message per month rate? I hope so! You didn't agree to whatever yahoo's spam policy, so you have no contract with them. Go collect your money, man!

    --
    "Your superior intellect is no match for our puny weapons!"
  71. I've done this by Andy+Muldowney · · Score: 3, Interesting

    A bank (Nation's Bank I think) called my cell phone one time. They claimed they "must have been given a wrong number" but the lady knew my name, so I wasn't buying it. I have no accounts with them, nor have I ever given out my cell to any companies. So I asked to speak with her manager. I happily told them that it was illegal to solicit to cell phones. They tried to feed me some more BS, so I asked for her manager. I finally got to someone decently high up, and they must have just been too busy to care, because they just said "send us a bill."

    So, I itemized the lost minutes, as well as about an hour's worth of lost wages (this was during work) and sent it off. Sure enough, about two weeks later I got a check in the mail.

    Needless to say, I didn't cash it...it makes a good story. Plus, my coworkers thought I was crazy when I was on the phone.

  72. Who the fuck modded that flamebait??? by purduephotog · · Score: 2

    You think I'm kidding about this? It took nearly 6 months to get everything back in order after they wiped it.

    I'd post the page but frankly I don't think it'd be appreciated.

    And yes, politeness counts, as well as the links to his death in the newspapers / court cases.

  73. Bouncing by Otto · · Score: 2

    Yahoo could easily fix this. All they'd have to do is to setup their mailing lists like every other mailing list in the world, and auto remove subscribers whose messages bounce back X times.

    --
    - Give a man a fire and he's warm for a day, but set him on fire and he's warm for the rest of his life.
    1. Re:Bouncing by kevlar · · Score: 2

      Thats assuming a bounce would ever occur. Besides, a bounce is hardly a legitimate notice that a phone is not being used. Most providers do not even supply error responses to messages, even if the message is never delivered because the phone is off.