Declaring War on Mobile Phone Spam

RugbyHoe writes "Silicon.com's Will Sturgeon reports that more than two-thirds of mobile phone users have received spam on their cell phones and raises the concern that spam will become as much of a problem on this medium as it is with e-mail. He continues with a warning that many companies that offer downloadable ring tones are guilty of 'harvesting' your phone number. Think about that the next time you think you need to annoy your neighbors with the latest and greatest fiddy-cent ring tone."

Comments

dang!

[sweeney37]

just when I thought that text message about penis enlargement was someone picking me up!

why must you dash my hopes Slashdot?!

Mike

Re:dang!

[gosand]

just when I thought that text message about penis enlargement was someone picking me up! why must you dash my hopes Slashdot?!

For those not familiar with dating: If a girl mentions something to you about enlarging your penis, she probably isn't picking up on you.

Fiddy Cent ringtones???

[SomeoneGotMyNick]

My ringtones have been costing me a dollar each!!!

50cent ringtones?

[drgroove]

What's next!? Eminem ringtones?

Re:One digit off

[Lumpy]

My number is one digit off from a local radio stations contest line, does that count as spam?

I badly want to answer "You WIN, come down to the station in the next hour", then turn the phone off.

Bah, my current cellphone recently had it's number changed as the first 3 digits were the dyslexic's choice to dial for a local credit union.
and yes the last 4 were the same.

I gave many people a scare that after answering it normally they still asked for information on their account...

"Yes, mam. your account is overdrawn by $5982.53... no I dont know who.. all it shows is that you came in and withdrew money last sunday... Mam, computers dont lie...."

Or....

"I'm sorry sir, but your account was frozen by the federal government under suspicion of terrorist activities. I cant give out any more information..."

It was quite a blast there for a while :-)

Beat the Phone Spam

[Anonymous Coward]

Before I got call intercept service, everytime I got a telemarketing call on my land phone line , this was my conversation with the telemarketer:

Telemarketer - "Sir, my name is Poor_Kid and I am calling on to let you know about our new offer called Rip_you_off"

Me - "Why did you call me on my cellphone"

Telemarketer - "Sir, I am sorry. I did not know that it was your cellphone number"

Me - "You bet it is !! Now take my cellphone number off of your call list."

Telemarketer - "Will do sir. You have a good day."

Re:Depends alot on your network.

[L7_]

Changing operator?

I have gotten like 5 or so unsolicited text messages (SMS is for europeans, in america we call it Freedom Text! ;)) from my provider. Thats my provider (which sure as shit doesnt pay for them) telling me about upgrades and stuff to my accout, or offers that I could take advantage of.

Re:Pricefight

[Mike Schiraldi]

Perl is better. :)

$ perl -e 'for $i (50000 .. 59999) { print "mail 21255$i\@mobile.example.com < spam.txt\n" }' | sh

*RING*-"it's your birthday"-*RING*

[WwWonka]

"Uh hello?"

"HI! How would YOU like to be the first on your block to buy a mint commerative Asian penis enlarging hair restoring stay hard college loan credit reducing pyramid scheme from Africa?"

"Capn' Taco! It's for you."

Phone number harvesting

[HopeUnknown]

...many companies that offer downloadable ring tones are guilty of 'harvesting' your phone number.

I find it amusing that as I read this article, Slashdot is displaying banner ads for "49 cent ringtones and graphics!", "Free Nokia Ringtones", and "RingtoneJukebox.com."

settle down there Beavis!

[Thud457]

"will bomb your armpit of a country into the stone age.

That's partly why they all have shiney new infrastructure while the U.S. is struggling to roll out last-generation technology!

I know! Let's bomb ourselves back into the stoneage, and then give ourselves the money to rebuild our industries with the latest equiptment!