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FCC Hangs Blockbuster $37.5 Million Fine Over Robocaller Accused of Spoofing Real Numbers:
The FCC has announced its proposal to impose a fine of $37.5 million on a company accused of making robocalls and hiding the calls' origin behind the real phone numbers of consumers. The agency is attempting to show that it's cracking down on the out of control robocall industry, but critics say it's too little, too late.
On Wednesday, the FCC said that it was alerted by a whistleblower about the robocall practices of an Arizona-based company called Affordable Enterprises. According to the announcement, the company "made more than 2.3 million maliciously-spoofed telemarketing calls to Arizonans during a 14-month span starting in 2016 to sell home improvement and remodeling services."
Spoofing is the term for using various techniques to display a different phone number on a robocall target's caller-ID than the number that's actually being used by the caller. What makes the Affordable Enterprises case different is that it's accused of intentionally using phone numbers that belong to consumers. This makes it hard to file a complaint against the company and leads to confused Americans fielding angry phone calls out of the blue.
(Score: 2) by Subsentient on Friday September 28 2018, @04:04AM (14 children)
Phone is an ancient protocol with too many limitations and vulnerabilities.
What replaces it should be decentralized like bittorrent and run on top of UDP with mandatory high-grade SSL. Wish I had time to write something like that. The world needs it.
"It is no measure of health to be well adjusted to a profoundly sick society." -Jiddu Krishnamurti
(Score: 2) by takyon on Friday September 28 2018, @04:12AM
"Can you hear me now?"
*absolute silence*
[SIG] 10/28/2017: Soylent Upgrade v14 [soylentnews.org]
(Score: 5, Funny) by richtopia on Friday September 28 2018, @05:26AM (1 child)
Can you add "blockchain" to your elevator pitch? Because then you'll have financiers tripping over themselves to give you money.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday September 28 2018, @03:18PM
We'll need more clean coal to fuel our blockchain.
(Score: 1, Interesting) by Anonymous Coward on Friday September 28 2018, @09:46AM (2 children)
Anyone know of any tools, hardware or software, that the average joe can use to try and track down the real source of the calls? I get enough of these nightly that I'm fed up with it. Per the FCC site:
https://www.fcc.gov/consumers/guides/spoofing-and-caller-id [fcc.gov]
"When is spoofing illegal?
Under the Truth in Caller ID Act, FCC rules prohibit anyone from transmitting misleading or inaccurate caller ID information with the intent to defraud, cause harm or wrongly obtain anything of value. Anyone who is illegally spoofing can face penalties of up to $10,000 for each violation. However, spoofing is not always illegal. There are legitimate, legal uses for spoofing, like when a doctor calls a patient from her personal mobile phone and displays the office number rather than the personal phone number or a business displays its toll-free call-back number."
So, these robo/sales calls are illegal. But how can you report them when don't have a real number or name to give? I try to keep them on the phone long enough to get some details, but they're quick to figure that out and drop the call.
(Score: 2) by Pslytely Psycho on Friday September 28 2018, @09:53AM (1 child)
I like to hold them on the line, pretend to be interested and about two minutes into the call have my wife yell "We've got them!."
At that point I tell them they are required to remain on the line until the authorities arrive.
They hang up quick, and I rarely get a call back from that particular scam.
However, the "This is Windows calling, you have a virus" are just way too much fun to fuck with. But even they have seemed to of quit calling of late.
Alex Jones lawyer inspires new TV series: CSI Moron Division.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday September 28 2018, @12:45PM
> "This is Windows calling...
Lucky you, may they leave you in peace going forward.
We got one yesterday, seems we get a couple of these per week.
(Score: 2) by Nuke on Friday September 28 2018, @12:12PM (7 children)
And how would that solve the robotcall problem?
(Score: 2) by Subsentient on Friday September 28 2018, @12:24PM (6 children)
For one, much harder to spoof.
"It is no measure of health to be well adjusted to a profoundly sick society." -Jiddu Krishnamurti
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday September 28 2018, @02:28PM
Especially with blockchain.
(Score: 2) by Pino P on Friday September 28 2018, @02:54PM (2 children)
How can you tell in advance whether the holder of the keypair calling you is someone who knows you personally, someone who wants to buy or has bought the product/service that you have offered to sell, or someone who wants to sell you something you don't want?
(Score: 2) by Subsentient on Saturday September 29 2018, @12:49AM (1 child)
For one, you could give out authorization tokens with your "phone number" and revoke them if they give them to third parties.
"It is no measure of health to be well adjusted to a profoundly sick society." -Jiddu Krishnamurti
(Score: 2) by Pino P on Saturday September 29 2018, @11:49PM
How would a user of this system publish a token for first contact, so that prospective clients could contact the user, without allowing telemarketers to contact the user using the same token?
(Score: 2) by Nuke on Saturday September 29 2018, @08:54AM (1 child)
So are you people saying that you could create a whitelist? Surely that can be done with existing systems, or am I wrong? Genuine question, I've never tried it, and believe it may need a special phone or special contract with the phone company.
(Score: 2) by Subsentient on Saturday September 29 2018, @02:10PM
It's possible on some phones and VoIP stuff, but it's not uniform and not well supported.
This would fix that.
"It is no measure of health to be well adjusted to a profoundly sick society." -Jiddu Krishnamurti