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Phone companies and state attorneys general join forces to fight robocalls
US consumers receive as many as 350,000 unwanted calls every three minutes, according to the FCC. Despite multiple efforts to end the onslaught, an estimated 4.7 billion robocalls hit American phones in July alone. Now, attorneys general from all 50 states and the District of Columbia are teaming up with 12 carriers in a united effort to prevent and block the spam calls.
Under the new agreement, the carriers will implement call-blocking technology, make anti-robocall tools free to consumers and deploy a system that labels calls as legitimate or spam, The Washington Post reports. The companies also agree to aid investigations by law enforcement. The major players -- AT&T, Comcast, Sprint, T-Mobile and Verizon (Engadget's parent company) -- are on board, as well as smaller carriers -- Bandwidth, CenturyLink, Charter, Consolidated, Frontier, US Cellular and Windstream. Though, there's no deadline for the companies to implement these measures.
(Score: 1, Funny) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday August 24 2019, @02:05PM (2 children)
It's anti-terrorism.
We've all seen the TV plots where the bad guys wire a phone to a bomb so they can call and remote detonate it at the time of maximum impact. What if all the phone spam is a way to prevent that.
Scenario:
(Scene 1) Montage of Modamneded assembling his pressure cooker and plugging the phone in. We see him carry it out to his SUV.
(Scene 2) A view through the windscreen as he drives to his Target (or Walmart).
(Scene 3) Cut to a darkskinned individual in a white shirt sitting at a desk talking into a phone headset. He has an indian accent and a nametag of "Reginald".
(Scene 4) Cut to closeup of some paperwork for Modamneded's phone. The camera zooms in until the last three digits fill the screen.
(Scene 5) Cut back to some more of Modamneded driving.
(Scene 6) Cut to somebody screaming into their phone and hanging up on "Reginald". He calmly starts dialing the next number on a list. The camera zooms in on the keypad as his fingers hit the same last three digits as we saw before.
(Scene 7) A closeup view into the SUV through the windscreen. Modamneded is calm and at peace driving it. Suddenly, the sound of a phone's ringtone. Modamneded's face turns to a panicked expression. The camera pulls back as the SUV fills with fire before exploding all over the highway.
(Scene 8) Cut back to "Reginald" waiting for an answer. He gives up and starts dialling the next number. The scene fades as the credits roll.
(Score: 2) by takyon on Saturday August 24 2019, @02:09PM
If there is an app for that™, it should allow you to specify an incoming number or list of numbers for triggering detonation.
[SIG] 10/28/2017: Soylent Upgrade v14 [soylentnews.org]
(Score: 1, Funny) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday August 24 2019, @03:23PM
(Scene 2) Trump uses the presidential alert system and calls every cell phone number at the same time.
(Scene 3) Every wannabe Mohammad clockboy goes "poof"
much better