FTC Crackdown Stops Operations Responsible for Billions of Illegal Robocall
engine
4:59 pm on Mar 27, 2019 (gmt 0)
The F.T.C. has said its stopped four separate organisations that between them made billions of robocalls on auto warranties, debt-relief services, home security systems, fake charities, and Google search results services.
I had to follow the link to convince myself you didn't put in that last one as a joke. Is SEO now such a widespread concern that it's a subject for telemarketing? Sigh.
engine
5:44 pm on Mar 27, 2019 (gmt 0)
Yup, it's real. These robocalls are a huge annoyance.
lucy24
6:12 pm on Mar 27, 2019 (gmt 0)
I simply don’t answer my phone. I wait for them to leave a message and then grab it in the remote case that it turns out to be a human calling for me personally. (Caller ID costs money.) And the cell phone only accepts calls from people on my Contact list.
:: insert witticism about success rate of SEO services initiated by junk phone call as opposed to industry-wide average success rate ::
LifeinAsia
6:20 pm on Mar 27, 2019 (gmt 0)
(Caller ID costs money.)
And the robocallers spoof CallerID anyway.
lucy24
8:10 pm on Mar 27, 2019 (gmt 0)
Yah, but it's not likely they would randomly spoof the number of someone I actually know--or even the number of a local business, where caller ID would also show the business name and I’d know if I’m expecting a call from them. In fact I’ve just come from wiping my cell phone’s call log. They all claim to be from the local area code, for all the good it did them. (Or else they claim to be from an 800-type number, which I’m pretty sure isn’t even physically possible.)
Astounding but true: the number of junk calls did drop slightly after I put my cell number on the DNC list. At least, the call log doesn’t fill up as fast.
toidi
2:34 pm on Mar 28, 2019 (gmt 0)
and these 4 companies are already being replaced. The FTC needs to go after the carriers for letting this happen. The carriers know when calls are being made from a source faster than humans can perform. They also know when spoofed numbers are being used. They could easily just stop it at the source.
Hoople
5:20 am on Apr 2, 2019 (gmt 0)
[stolen from facebook] answer the call as - "Sherriff Office, Fraud Department"
mack
7:55 pm on Apr 4, 2019 (gmt 0)
One thing that is happening a lot more here is spoofing the number of popular phone banking services. The chances are people will have that saved in their mobile. If they happen to hit a number of a customer who has the bank saved in their mobile it makes the call seem more credible. They are certainly getting smarter.
