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First Caller-ID Spoofers Punished
coondoggie plugs a NetworkWorld story that begins, "The first telemarketers charged with transmitting false Caller IDs ... to consumers were fined and barred from continuing their schemes by a New Jersey District Court judge.... [T]wo individuals and one corporate defendant have been barred from violating the agency's Telemarketing Sales Rule and its Do Not Call requirements ... They were also found liable for $530,000 in damages ... [T]he case was the first brought by the Commission alleging the transmission of phony caller ID information or none at all."
I hope that this set precedent for spammers.
http://what-is-what.com/what_is/spam.html
It is dangerous to be right when the government is wrong.
you find out they don't have it and are only paying 45,000 in fines..
every day http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Special:Random
Call me! No wait! Don't call me! *wink wink*
That's a whole lot of money for getting called.
You know who else should get slapped with a fine? Companies that hire telemarketers.
When "hackers" get caught, it's not uncommon for the judge to ban them from using computers for a period of time. Ban the caller ID spoofers from using a telephone for a few years, either for business or personal use (with an emergency usage exception).
Send all telemarketers to hell
"...calling consumers on the National DNC Registry"
Maybe someone can help me understand something here. Why would a company want to waste their resources marketing to people who have made an overt effort to opt-out? Do they really think that people will make a purchase if they could through?
Personally, I've put my number on the "do not call list" and I wouldn't buy anything from a telemarketer purely as a matter of principle - I'd pay more elsewhere just to avoid encouraging this form of marketing. I've never met anyone who didn't feel similar about getting sales calls at home.
Alex, I'll take keybindings not used by Emacs for $400....
I never understood the direct marketer's devotion to marketing by force.
If I'm on the Do Not Call list, why do you still want to call me? Even if there was no enforcement, I've registered because:
1) I'm not buying your crap
and
2) Marketing calls annoy the hel out of me
What possible benefit is there to your operatives calling me, getting an earful, wasting their time and spoiling my day?
I mean, if you're spoofing the Caller ID, you know that I'm going to hang up on you if I guess who it is, at which point you have to ask yourself, what the fuck do you think is the point about calling me?
I have a fun method of handling the few calls that remain. I start out by asking them for their company name and a valid phone number. When they ask why, I tell them that I need that information to fill out a report on the Federal Trade Commission website. Then I say, before they can hang up that they should put my number on the really really really don't call list.
Lately I've been getting calls from 000-000-0000 numbers. One time it was Obama's campaign calling, another some other thing (I can't recall right now)... but it's happening more frequently and annoying the piss out of me!
What the hell is this [T] business?
and I HATE spam.
MSBPodcast.com The opinions expressed here are my own. If you don't like 'em... Think up your own stuff.
To those people asking why you would want to call a "Do Not Call" list anyway...
I know a few people who work in telesales and it's usually the stupid and draconian rules put on the employees by the company, despite there being no actual proof that they would improve sales. In fact, in some places where they listen to the employees, changes can be made to INCREASE sales by cutting out known-bad calls as soon as possible.
E.g. (these are ACTUAL examples of PRESENT policies among some UK tele-sales offices)
"You can not hang up on the customer. They must hang up."
One of my friends had a three-hour ordeal with a woman whose husband had died and had to persist trying to sell to her because she could only plead for THEM to hang up, she was so upset. Yes, the woman should have just hung up rather than upsetting herself but she was hardly thinking straight.
"You must try to make an appointment for a salesman to call, even if you know it will mean no sale."
So tele-sales were booking appointments with people who were so annoyed at the telesales that they were threatening violent action. They were talking these people into BOOKING AN APPOINTMENT with a real, physical representative of the company who then turns up their house only to be pulverised.
On a similar tack, I just had a sleazy salesman knock at my door the other day. His opening words, while flashing an EDF Energy ID card, were "Hi, we're from EDF Energy and we're here to give you a new prepayment electricity key". Okay, I'm listening. I have a pre-pay meter. But I know there's something not quite right. The following conversation then ensued.
"Okay... erm... but I don't think I'm with EDF." (I'm actually with E-On but I was sufficiently confused between the two to take a second. Note that in this second he would not have been allowed access to the property or even the meter cupboard anyway. I'm not THAT stupid).
"Oh. Well. Would you mind telling us who you *are* with then?"
"Erm. You know? I'm not telling you."
"Why not?"
"I believe you're a salesman. Goodbye."
"Thank you sir."
Two hours later, he was back and I opened the door again (the wife had been suitably alerted by this time anyway so she would have slammed the door in his face too). He only said "Oh, it's you. We've spoken to you."
What got me was the unbelievably casual fraud (they implied, even if the actual words didn't say, that they were my current electricity supplier when in fact they were planning to sign me up to a new electricity supplier by inserting the key into my meter). And the fact that they went up the road and obviously carried on with the same line for the rest of the afternoon before turning back and trying the houses that they'd missed.
If I hadn't been in the middle of laying a new floor at the time, I would have shouted down the street and knocked on everybody's doors to warn them myself, or call the police and make them explain themselves. They may have been doing nothing "wrong" but I'm sure that a police officer wouldn't take kindly to their sales pitch and it would cause them enough trouble to try another street.
Guess what happens next time I'm choosing an electricity supplier? The ones who commit fraud on my doorstep don't get included.
I for one, propose barring everyone from violating this rule. Surely this will put an end to spoofed telemarketing for good.
Will it actually change their marketing ploys? I doubt it.
Just the other day, I was taking care of dinner and kids when phone rang. It had my wife's name (yes, I have; and yes some role reversal, but I get home earlier, etc..) Without thinking, I answered. It was a stinking telemarketer. When I chewed her out and she hung up, I looked back at the caller ID log. Instead of my wife's name and cell phone # as usual, it had wife's name and our own land line phone number! So not only did this company spoof the name, but also the #. And it seems to happen a lot lately!
We don't answere the phone unless it is someone we know, and now I have to even worry about that! No, I'm not dodging creditors, I just rank time with kids and family as more important than solicitations for "Troopers association" or other junk callers. If I need your service, I'll look you up. Don't bug me with calls when I'm with the family!
--- Relax, that mass muderer is just trying to reduce our carbon footprint, one fetus at a time...
If I understand this correctly, they may no longer violate the rule because they've been... barred from violating the rule.
That's correct. They're now on double secret probation.
I've been thinking lately that it would be fun to implement some kind of interactive voice response system at home to deal with telemarketers. Ideally it would be something highly configurable with advanced scripting capability that allows the software to carry on a truly inane "conversation" with a telemarketer - something like the soundboard calls we've all heard on the 'net but completely automated with no human interaction required. The idea is that as soon as I realize I've got a telemarketer on the line, I can quietly hit star-something, hang up the phone, and then sometime later post the resulting audio recording to a website for the amusement of the general masses.
So far the only candidate software I've found is the open-source project TOEJAM - http://toejam.sourceforge.net/
Part of their punishment was to be barred from violating the very rules they were convicted of violating?! Does that make any sense?!
If someone says he and his monkey have nothing to hide, they almost certainly do.
I'd been getting calls from "Card Services", representing themselves as being with my credit card company, once a day or so for a while. I whipped out a short blog entry one day just to vent, and somehow ended up with several thousands hits per month on it. Apparently I wasn't the only one they were driving crazy. It's good to see that these cretins are finally being reined in.
Dewey, what part of this looks like authorities should be involved?
Somewhat misleading, I feel this article's title should have said "First Caller ID Spoofing Spammers" rather than spoofers.
More damaging than spoofing spammers are spoofing scammers. More than one company's security protocols were thwarted by the individual misrepresented as "calling from their registered phone number", making the agent believe the caller was legitimately who they were impersonating.
Lacking security protocols aside, Caller-ID Spoofing is a BAD practice, and should be governed by a responsible oversight board. I would like to see it requiring a court order or some sort of pre-authorization before allowing it to occur. I can see the benefit for things like VoIP calls registering to an actual telephone number, but the potential for abuse is about as ripe as a potential scammer's creativity permits.
The judge later reversed his decision, after receiving phone calls from the president, the secretary of the UN, the pope, and Elvis. "It's amazing how similar all them sound", said the surprised judge.
To bad, you should try it fried.. about 3 o'clock in the morning.. when its the only thing in the fridge and your to tired and hungry to give a fuck.
Supporting World Peace Through Nuclear Pacification
We've been seeing this problem in the Lowell, MA area, from time-to-time. I've also seen how some legitimate phone calls (from companies) are using CallerID spoofing - I still think that should be illegal.
I'm wondering:
1) How did they track down the telemarketers who were spoofing. Obviously they left or gave information about their identity and product.
2) How are these companies being permitted to spoof their Caller-ID? I read an article in alt.2600 a while ago about some of this, but the details escape me.
I even had a marketing front for The American Cancer Society (and others) calling, looking for "volunteers" - and when I complained to them, they said that seeking volunteers was not covered under the Do Not Call rules. Very sneaky and clever, eh?
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The site obviously has an agenda (which I wholeheartedly support) and that is to encourage people to stop using Internet Exploder. I use Opera and it didn't complain, then switched my user-agent string to Mozilla (menu option) and it still didn't complain. The I switched it to IE6 and it complained. Then I switched it to IE7 and it complained. Every site should do this (a quick google turned up only 3 sites). Maybe this could start a movement!
Do like Tom Mabe does, don't get mad when a telemarketer calls... get even!
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=un_PjRXV5l8/
Kickass Cheap Web Hosting
Only if you by 'a dash' mean alot and by 'paprika' you mean tequila
Gives us legitimate telemarketing companies a bad name.
Yeah, right.
Why is it necessary to bar a person from violating a rule? Doesn't the very existence of the rule already imply it should not be violated?
When these sorts of people call him, he gets them going "off-script" and then starts a verbal interchange that is absolutely hilarious to listen to one end of the conversation. When the conversation starts going onto the subject of alien invasions and impending catastrophe, you just *know* the call's going to come to a close in a few moments, with the caller being the one to hang up.
File under 'M' for 'Manic ranting'
Why don't they just close that gaping caller ID security hole? Spoofing shouldn't be possible in the first place.
Any sufficiently unpopular but cohesive argument is indistinguishable from trolling.
But I decided to deny the friendship; knowing that Betty Crocker, Aunt Jemima and Mother F*cker would leave me to an overpowering odor.
My brother has the best anti-telemarketing idea. He always says "yes". "Yes I need my house painted." He makes an apointment for them to come out and gives them a time when he is not home. Causes the ideots to waste hours of their time and a few galons of gas. We should all do this.
What I do is place them on hold - forever. This wastes more of their time then if I simply hung the phone up.
It seems to me that a simple hang-up is just as (not very) effective at stopping telemarketing as a phenomenon, and takes about 1/100th the time.
I try to be considerate to other persons: let them merge in traffic, hold the door open, not stand in front of the shelf they want to look at, and so forth, but I'm not really inclined to martyr my own time so that someone somewhere won't get a call. That person can do the same as I: just hang up.
Score one for us. I've been receiving calls with spoofed CIDs for the past 3-4 months, including on my cell phone. Up to 8-10 calls a day, and nights too. About 2 months ago I filed a complaint with the FCC, not thinking it would help much. Yet about a month after that I received a notice that my complaint was being investigated, and the volume of calls dropped almost immediately. I still get 1-2 calls a day, not every day though. And at least they stopped calling my cell phone altogether. I wonder if these were the guys doing it, or maybe there are more cases down the pipeline.
I hadn't known there were so many idiots in the world until I started using the Internet -Stanislaw Lem
There are *no* legitimate telemarketing companies. Nobody has ever asked you to call them on the telephone and try to sell them something; stop trying to pretend otherwise. If you call me with a sales pitch, regardless of what it is or who you represent, I'll want your head on a pike.
/. advocate yelling at callers and all of these other crazy ideas - but it is so far out of line with what has happened to you. No one called and yelled at you, and why would you want to yell at a 60 year old woman who wants something to do with her life? (Or a innocent kid - most of the younger crowd we would get are serious college students who love a flexible job that lets them read between calls. And with the available jobs out there for these demographics, be happy they are working period.)
What a laugh!
Sure, no one calls a telemarketer and asks them to call back - that logic fails when you are talking about an industry that thrives on cold calling.
Let me share; I work for a company that sells its product through telemarketing. I also used to work in the telemarketing office. At this point I must point out that you are asking for retirees and teenagers heads on a pike. The rest of the room is usually filled with people who've made mistakes in life and are trying to turn it around for the better. My point here is that the telemarketers themselves aren't evil - they are either trying to get by or are good at what they do, plain and simple. I see people on
I guess you could say that the management is evil, they are the ones forcing this poor people into making these calls. But lets speak to your point made in your post; telemarketing simply works. We have three avenues for marketing our product (directly to consumers), mail, phone and e-mail. (Aside: E-mail has been reserved for communications with existing customers and we have no desire to use this method.)
But since I'm the database marketing analyst and do these reports weekly, across the spectrum, let's look at the figures and you can decide if we can refute your argument:
Mail:
Response rate is, on average, 1.5% and we mail 10,000 addresses a month. I've tried to communicate to those higher than me on the totem poll that, yes, we are getting orders from this method, but it is a huge waste of money. The cost per order is sometimes as high as $25.
Phones:
The closing rate is anywhere from 5%-15% depending on the type of calling campaign (sequential numbers, targeted Prizm lists, new movers, etc). This means that in ~300 calling hours we would net ~475 orders. That's in just one week. Our voluntary sign up rate is the only one that is higher for new orders. The cost per order by the way: $2 - $7 depending on the week, how many calling hours, orders, and other costs.
Which would you employ?
The question then must be asked; why do you think that people don't want to be called and sold to? Yes, you don't, and many others don't, but plenty of people do. This isn't to say it's right or wrong to call someone to market to them (not my issue, and certainly one that could be debated until the end of time because there is no right answer). The reality is that it is simple economics - people buy so there is an economic incentive to call them and make a pitch.
As far as DNC lists are concerned; we are overly cautious. In fact, the best thing that could have happened to the telemarketing industry (overall) is the National Do Not Call Registry - it helps us avoid people who would verbally abuse a phone rep when a simple "no" or "place me on your do not call list" would suffice. Maybe you've had a bad experience with a company, but painting us all with the same brush... well that's prejudice (and I guess racism if you think you are just plain better than these 'scum of the earth' telemarketers).
But hell, if you think I'm lying let's look at some published numbers! Now I'll disclose the product in question: a newspaper. You know that dying old thing that no one wants anymore because th
Get your Unix fortune now!
"Card Services" is one of the names used by the infamous Ran Barnea. He has set up a multitude of shell companies -- perhaps so when you demand to not be called by one company, he can legitimately switch to another and continue the barrage.
Take a few minutes, go here: http://heatherwithaccountservices.com/ and file the complaints specified in the April 14th post.
This guy needs to be put away.
Then call them and stop calling me and those of us who don't want to be called. ...
This argument falls flat when we continue to get telemarketing calls from companies who bypass the DNC list with loopholes.
First point: Sign up on the list, problem solved. Otherwise, can't help ya.
Second point: Don't lump us in with the criminals, you can't argue your logic against my points when you are using them as a go-between. It's like saying I'm a religious Jew who must defend myself against your view of Catholics...
They are criminals and haven't been punished enough.
Get your Unix fortune now!
The fact that your method gets results does not make it ethical or honorable. I could employ someone named Guido to come to your house and threaten to break your kneecaps if you didn't renew your magazine subscriptions. I'm sure my closing rate would then be very close to 100%. But guess what, I wouldn't do that because unlike all telemarketers, I'm not scum. Also, stop using the old excuse that you're trying to give some gainful employment to poor, down-trodden teenagers and retirees. That excuse doesn't work for drug pushers, and it doesn't work for you. Head, meet pike.
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