VoIP to Fuel Plague of 'Dialing for Dollars'/Spam 396
Ant writes "Broadband Reports says Internet News is exploring how telemarketers world-wide are realizing they can dodge long-distance costs (and U.S. "Do Not Call" restraints) by voice spamming VoIP users. Different from SPIT (spam over internet telephony) because it's not automated, an analyst in the article predicts homes and businesses could see some 150 calls a day from overseas call centers."
The ring that keeps on ringing (Score:5, Interesting)
Re:The ring that keeps on ringing (Score:5, Interesting)
There exist many methods for anti-spam authentication [google.com]. Why hasn't someone implemented one of them in an "Email 2.0" style service with the single feature being "not compatible with existing email, including spam"? After the first service opened up for business, there would be more. And more. Until Spam was gone for good.
We can see that people are getting to the point of ditching it entirely [slashdot.org] so why not move to something that fixes the problem at the expense of backward compatibility? This befuddles me to no end. I'd sign up in a heartbeat and so would everyone email user that I know.
Can we just FUCK backward compatibility for once? Why is it so damn important?
Re:The ring that keeps on ringing (Score:5, Insightful)
Why on earth would I (or anyone) use this? The entire point of email is communicating with people. If I got an "email 2.0" address, but nobody who needs to email me has one, what would be the point in me having it? And if it got popular enough that the people I want to communicate with all had it, wouldn't the spammers just get it, too?
Now, I could maybe understanding coming up with something like this for intra-company communications or something, where a specific list of people would get the new format of email and they could all talk to each other but nobody from the outside could email in. But they'd still need traditional email for any communications outside the company. And what company could do any business these days without emailing (or receiving email from) anyone outside?
I just can't see any way at all that something like that would work.
Re:The ring that keeps on ringing (Score:2)
Re:The ring that keeps on ringing (Score:3, Interesting)
Re:The ring that keeps on ringing (Score:3, Interesting)
Aside from that basic problem wit
Re:The ring that keeps on ringing (Score:2)
Re:The ring that keeps on ringing (Score:3, Insightful)
> authentication. Why hasn't someone implemented
> one of them in an "Email 2.0" style service with
> the single feature being "not compatible with
> existing email, including spam"? After the first
> service opened up for business, there would be
> more. And more. Until Spam was gone for good.
because that wouldn't work either.
idiot windows users would tell their mail software to remember their authentication password, and spammer viruses would be re
Re:The ring that keeps on ringing (Score:2)
Re:The ring that keeps on ringing (Score:2)
now, can I send an email to you in any of those protocols? probably not.
compability is useful because it makes the whole thing useful and more than an inhouse mailer.
Re:The ring that keeps on ringing (Score:3, Interesting)
1. These exist already. They're called whitelists.
2. In addition to blocking spam, they block email from many legitimate sources, such as companies/mailing lists/etc trying to send you email from an address you aren't expecting. We get subscribers all the time who sign up and yet never get on because they have a whitelist service and are too stupid
Re:The ring that keeps on ringing (Score:4, Interesting)
I run my own domain. Aside from running a web site that's basicly just a dumping ground for files for me, I use it for my email.
If use myname@example.org as my primary email address, then I'll use that for giving out purposes to friends, etc.
Everyone else follow this simple format: If I sign up for a msn account, I'll use msn@example.org If I sign up for a carfax thingy, I'll use carfax@example.org It all forwards to myname@example.org anyway, but this way, if I ever recieve any spam, I instantly know where they got my address, and I can blacklist anything with that address in the header.
So far, I have 5 addresses blacklisted, from the past 3 years, simply because I'm careful about where I use my email address and what checkboxes are checked when I sign up for something.
I do not do this with my business sites, because well, frankly, I need my address published for those. They get a ton of spam. But I have a plan to work around that too.
Re:The ring that keeps on ringing (Score:3, Insightful)
If I started using this hypothetical "email 2.0", I would, of course, keep an old "email
Re:The ring that keeps on ringing (Score:3, Interesting)
What I've decided is that e-mail needs to be simpler. Instead of four different daemons (IMAPd, POP3d, SMTPd, LDAP, and optionally an SQL server) running seven different protocols and standards (SMTP, IMAP, POP3, LDAP, SQL, SASL, SSL, TLS, SQL) that still don't work together because the e-mail clients all suck (with the poss
Sue them!!! (Score:5, Interesting)
I got spammed by Avtech Direct [barbieslapp.com]. I sent a demand letter, they were nasty in their response. I filed a lawsuit against them, and arranged for 15 other people to file lawsuits. When they appeared in court against me, I served them with the 20 other lawsuits. So far, only 5 of 21 cases were heard, they have over $11,000 in judgments against them. I have not seen any spam from them since.
Re:Sue them!!! (Score:5, Informative)
No. (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:The ring that keeps on ringing (Score:3, Insightful)
By now (2005) we all have caller ID, answering machines, call back, etc etc etc.
Here's a novel idea: If you don't want to pick up the phone, don't.
On the weekends, when I don't want to be disturbed, I turn the phone ringer off, the answering machine sound down, and ignore the things entirely.
If it's an important call, the answering machine will get it, and the caller id will grab the number.
If it's not important, they won't leave a m
Re:The ring that keeps on ringing (Score:3, Informative)
I don't get ANY telemarketing calls anymore and I'm not even on the DoNotCall list.
150 is a lot if it's not automated (Score:3, Interesting)
But I do see this becomming a problem. Maybe there will be a setting you can set to block all calls from IP, rendering the entire technology useless.
I won't have a problem completely disconnecting my phone if I get 15 calls a day from telemarketers though.
Re:The ring that keeps on ringing (Score:2)
-nB
Re:The ring that keeps on ringing (Score:2)
Re:The ring that keeps on ringing (Score:3, Informative)
I get phone spam from the US, and I'm in the UK do-not-call equivalent (the TPS), so never get any UK based phone spam.
You can always tell it though... it's international with the number witheld, and the moment you pick it up someone with a US accent starts "Hi, you've won..." (I slam the phone down before he gets any further).
Re:The ring that keeps on ringing (Score:3, Insightful)
Like anyone else, I hate my job some days. But man, if I did stuff like that for a living, I'd hate my life. What a loser.
Re:The ring that keeps on ringing (Score:3, Interesting)
You make their job horrible and they'll either quit or demand more money. The more people that quit or demand more money the more money the telemarketing company will have to pay to keep employees. The more money the telemarketing company have to pay the less money they make. The less money they make the more expensive that form o
new acronym proposal... (Score:5, Interesting)
Re:The ring that keeps on ringing (Score:2)
You talking about the US Do Not Call list?
Re:The ring that keeps on ringing (Score:3, Funny)
Silly Idea (Score:5, Insightful)
Say the first 10 VOIP calls are free, and if you make the 11th call within 5 minutes of the 10th call, you pay 1 cent, and if you make your 12th call within 5 minutes of your 11th call, you pay 2 cents, then 4 cents, 8 cents and so on.
Private callers shouldn't have to pay anything due to the engaging nature of personal calls.
Businesses will have to register to get exemption from the charges, thus easily identifiable.
Like spam filters, this won't stop spammers from spamming, but hopefully it's enough to make it less profitable.
We didn't see email spams coming, but we should definitely do something on VOIP when we have the opportunity.
Re:Silly Idea (Score:5, Interesting)
Also keep in mind that a way around this would be to have a dozens (hundreds?) of VOIP services, meaning you would just need a system to switch between "lines". And that technology all ready exists.
Re:Silly Idea - We saw it coming (Score:5, Insightful)
Actually we did. The infamous Green Card Lawyers carpet-bombing Usenet told everybody paying attention that we stop it now, or it will only get worse.
Problem with politicians is that they don't react to a problem until after it has grown out of control. And they don't listen to the people who do see it coming.
That's why to this day, CB radio skips clear around the world. They didn't listen to the experts about assigning frequencies. Even now, with spam a problem for everyone, there is little in the way of effective law against it.
Re:Silly Idea (Score:2)
Oh come on, how often do you honestly make more than 10 calls in a five-minute period? I could see it happening occasionally, when someone needs to call everyone on their softball team to tell them a game's cancelled or whatever, but not often enough that it would have a huge impact on your phone bill. The only time I could see it seriously impacting the average person's phone bill is when their 13-year-old is voting for America
Better fix this (Score:5, Interesting)
Ah, so this is how they are going to use all that dark fiber.
Seriously though, it would be in the phone companies best interest to figure out how to block this. After the legislation for the do not call list, calls to our home plummeted. And rightly so. If I have to deal with telemarketers calling my home again, I will simply have the phone company disconnect my land line, especially with the prospect of 100-150 calls/day. Most people that really need to get ahold of me immediately can use the cell phone or email/IM me anyway. As for calling people at work, I cannot figure out how businesses will tolerate this. Businesses will be more likely to pressure phone companies to limit this kind of activity as it impacts productivity.
So, I don't really care how they do it, but from an end users perspective......They can either fix the loopholes and prevent phone spam or they will lose business.
On another note. Serious question to all the Slashdotters: Has anyone here actually bought ANYTHING from a telemarketer who called you? I have never purchased any good or service solicited over the phone, and I am wondering who it is that actually keeps these knuckleheads in business.
Re:Better fix this (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:Better fix this (Score:2)
What makes you think so? Vonage users can call anywhere for free. That's what makes this whole thing feasible and so much like spam in the first place. The only difference is that you have to pay someone to pick up the phone and call, but that can be someone in a third world country at 50 cents an hour.
Re:Better fix this (Score:2)
Sad, lonely, and impressionable shut-ins who are so desperate for someone to talk to that they will actually entertain marketers. At first it seems like that would describe slashdotters, but that group can always go to a LUG. I'm talking about elderly and infirm people.
Re:Better fix this (Score:5, Informative)
zerg (Score:2)
Even if 99.9% of people they cold-called call back and demand that the charges get removed, enough people won't call back. Do the math and you'll find this is highly profitable.
Re:zerg (Score:3, Insightful)
Actually, no I did not and all my credit card bills are scrutinized carefully. If anybody charges anything to my credit card that is not authorized, they are committing fraud and will be prosecuted as such. I don't know about your credit card companies, but mine have been very good about this. Any purchases that fall outside my normal purchase pattern are flagged and my credit card company calls me to ensure that they are
Re:Better fix this (Score:4, Insightful)
However, I can't see this becoming a problem. VoIP traffic is very easy to block. If you get a telemarketer, block them. It's not like they can change their internet provider every other day, and VoIP traffic, being two-way, is rather difficult to proxy through a hijacked machine (unlike email). And it's rather difficult to move a call center to another country.
Re:Better fix this (Score:5, Interesting)
All your friends have an unlisted number that is held private, or have a code to bypass the billing on the 1-900 line. Everyone else pays a buck a min. (15 min. minimum). I'll let them telemarketers pay me ~$180/Hour (figuring an average 5 min. call).
-nB
Re:Better fix this (Score:3, Interesting)
Re:waste a telemarketers time (Score:3, Interesting)
Vroom! (Score:5, Funny)
Re:Vroom! (Score:2)
I've always wondered why there werent any cellphones with a white-listing feature in them.
What? (Score:5, Funny)
Re:What? (Score:2)
I think this is a dirty tactic. As it is, I don't answer calls which the caller ID is blocked or otherwise not visible to me.
They will throw themselves upon the firewalls... (Score:5, Funny)
In fact, I'd imagine these call centres would be easier to firewall off the 'net than spammers, as it would be harder to switch net blocks once a blackhole service was set up to list the offending address ranges.
Re:They will throw themselves upon the firewalls.. (Score:5, Insightful)
Make sure you add to your list America's own 2nd/3rd world state, Florida.
Call Blocking? (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Call Blocking? (Score:2)
Not automated. Hmm (Score:5, Interesting)
Yes, that sounds like a GREAT way to make money.
Re:Not automated. Hmm (Score:4, Funny)
Common knowledge tells us that Telemarketing in general should not be a viable business. And yet, it is isn't it?
Re:Not automated. Hmm (Score:4, Funny)
Problem was, when I sent my subpoena to Novosibirsk all I got back was a legal notice saying, and I quote...
"In Soviet Russia, jurisdiction limits YOU."
The joys of computer controlled phones! (Score:4, Insightful)
There are so many possibilities for controlling this crap that I don't even want to go into it. Personally? I would use my addressbook (LDAP?) as the whitelist. Anyone else would get a message to find another way to contact me to be added to the whitelist, to enter the passcode to get through, or they be routed to
Anyone showing up as "UNKNOWN", "UNAVAILABLE", or originating numbers coming from outside the country would automatically be re-routed to
Yeah, it could cause you to lose some callers. How many times do people call you that you don't know and that you actually want to hear from? I'll take the 1 caller a year that doesn't know the passcode and can't find another way to contact me.
YMMV.
Re:The joys of computer controlled phones! (Score:3, Insightful)
Well, if you own a business where you sell a product or service, you hope it happens pretty dang often!
Re:The joys of computer controlled phones! (Score:3, Informative)
Anyone showing up as "UNKNOWN", "UNAVAILABLE", or originating numbers coming from outside the country would automatically be re-routed to
This is already available and has been for years. It's called
Culture shock (Score:5, Interesting)
It's already starting.
Ignoring people who have abandoned land-line phones for wireless, most of my friends are in the "phone by appointment only" mode.
If you want to talk to me on a land line, email (or IM) me first and tell me when you'll call. Otherwise, the damn thing stays unplugged, and/or with the ringer off. If I ain't expecting someone's call, it ain't getting answered.
Re:Culture shock (Score:5, Insightful)
VOIP spam is a really scary and almost unavoidable future. To combat it, I only give out my cell phone to people I know. I always give businesses my home or work number. But if it starts to be a problem, I bet a lot of the profiling techniques already used for filtering email will start happening on phone networks. And thankfully, I have never heard of a VOIP open relay, so we'll have a better chance at stopping the problem at its source.
Re:Culture shock (Score:3, Interesting)
Re:Culture shock (Score:3, Interesting)
I haven't thought about the way I handle these things before now. But now that I am thinking about it, I recall that:
- I'll answer random calls if I don't know specifically where my girlfriend
no (Score:3, Insightful)
your solution: (Score:3, Insightful)
simple. elegant. failsafe.
you're welcome.
Re:your solution: (Score:3, Insightful)
No. It's fail - dangerous .
What if the call had been from my father-in-laws hospice nurse, and she couldn't find the PIN? Or the nurse at his doctors office, (whose phone# field in their database almost certainly doesn't have a way to handle this)? I.E., at least twice in the last year a phone call
expect it. (Score:2)
Yes VOIP is good, so was the telephone until people realized their was money involved.
The only way I can see being able to slow down the title wave that is going to hit is for the companies that are supplying VOIP to listen to customers when they call and complain about phone numbers spamming them..... But again, we all know how well that works wit
Herm wait . . . (Score:5, Informative)
Re:Herm wait . . . (Score:2)
I've already started (Score:2)
Re:I've already started (Score:2)
Re:I've already started (Score:2)
I've had VoIP for 3 years (Score:2)
Infact i get more on my cell phone than i do on my VoIP.
Spamming is only done because it gets customers (Score:2)
VoIP spamming will be far more intrusive than email spamming, since a phone call *demands* an action in real time. This will make it far more annoying.
Re:Spamming is only done because it gets customers (Score:2)
You can turn the ringer off. It's not illegal, immoral, or even fattening. You also can listen to it ring and still choose not to answer it (we sometimes do this during meals - and we should do it more).
Realizing that you don't have to answer the phone every time it rings can be very freeing...
New MaBell filter (Score:3, Informative)
Re:New MaBell filter - crush the competition (Score:2)
It ought to be free. Even better, they ought to pay you to allow them to block VoIP. After all, you've just asked them to kill their only real competition!
Re:New MaBell filter (Score:3, Informative)
Anyone that runs a voip system can always have the system route UNKNOWN or ANONYMOUS callers to a computer based screening tool. One bored gent wrote an elaborate voice-mail maze for telemarketers to wander into.
Telemarketer Torture [voip-info.org]
So far the only prank SIP call I have received was one from a buddy that was testing his SIP knowledge and wanted to see if he could really make my phone ring.
re-routing (Score:4, Interesting)
This is unlikely (Score:2)
Scena
Mark my words... (Score:2, Funny)
We need laws, but tools too (Score:5, Informative)
However, we're also going to need some software tools. A lot of sites, my own workplace included, are rolling out VoIP systems. Some of these are COTS systems of various levels of quality. Others (like us) are using open systems like Asterisk PBX and SIP Express Router (SER). Currently, as far as I have seen neither the proprietary nor the open tools have what it takes regarding abuse rejection:
Re:We need laws, but tools too (Score:2)
Lord knows that last thing I want is another bipartisan effort to ream me up one end and down the other. Because CAN-SPAM was so, you know, USEFUL.
Whitelists (Score:2)
Next, a numeric code to let whitelist people through when not calling from a whitelisted telephone number.
Third, ASAP simple voice recognition to replace typing in a code for whitelisted callers. (E.g. "Hi, it's Mom...").
Someday, absolute identification of the person making the call so that Ca
Computer-controlled VOIP madness! (Score:2)
Push the incoming stream quietly into the background while you go on computing, no problem. Tie the spammer up as long as they'll let themselves get tied up. No skin off your nose.
For example, the VOIP software could have a set of control plugins that could be used to redirect the spammer's voice back at them (WILL YOU STOP REPEATING ME?), or direct your outgoing voice str
asterisk (Score:3, Interesting)
I want to say its as simple as detecting whether they are using a blocked number. None of these people are going to offer up their number right? What are the legal issues around spoofing? I know this is another capability asterisk has, but I would think there would some issues with a telemarketer using this to outright lie about where they are calling from...of course, would be hard to catch them too.
And like email... (Score:2)
Spammers will find their way around that too, I have no doubts. I can already change my outgoing callerid #, so i don't see why they can't either.
Voicemail voicemail voicemail (Score:5, Funny)
"Hi John, this is Pete. You just tried to call me, and left me voicemail about my attempted call a few minutes ago. Please call me back."
Since it's Voice over IP... (Score:2)
Re:Since it's Voice over IP... (Score:3, Informative)
A firewall won't do a thing to protect you. A caller ID based black list of challenge/response system could though.
Sounds like we need a RBL for phone numbers too. (Score:2)
I think it would be great if we had little boxes at home that we could flag messages as SPAM, that would update a RBL. And also check the CallerID against an RBL before answering.
We have fairly mature methods for identifying spam. Ob
pining for POTS (Score:3, Insightful)
Cordless was supposed to be better.
- Yes, because I'm not tethered to a wall in my house.
- No, because the neighbors can eavesdrop.
Cell was supposed to be better,
- Yes, in that I'm not tethered to my house.
- No, in that it still doesn't work as well or as often as my landline.
VOIP was supposed to be better
- Yes because it's cheaper / no old stakeholders
- No because it's not protected like my landline,
- No because this new stuff can happen,
- Maybe since we're not sure is it an intermediate step or is this "it"
And how many times have we had to ask THAT question... CDs were "it". DVDs were "it". Cable was the last pipe we'd ever need. No make that IP over Powerlines. Scrap that - wireless broadband! This just in - WiFi Mesh. 802.11 A - I mean B... er, no, um... G! Oops - N!
And I thought they were making up that stuff in the Matrix movies about only trusting physical landlines...
Sad, But True. (Score:5, Informative)
150 calls per day (Score:3, Informative)
The Human Factor... (Score:3, Insightful)
Spam mail is sent with a computer, in bulk, really fast.
One saving grace is that the telemarketers will generally use peopl (yes, there are some IVR calls, but the majority are humans). So hopefully the rate of return on the bulk number of calls needed to get a sale will make this ineffective.
I was telling people this before... "VoIP and other cheap unregulated phone service is great... but it will degrade into a state like email flooded with garbage"
Oh, and for fun, next time a charity calls... ask what percentage goes to the organization they are representing. Fun game.
VoIP Users Only? (Score:3, Interesting)
Another thing... Is there a way that VoIP numbers are indexed or listed? Is there such thing as a listed or unlisted VoIP line?
clarification? (Score:3, Interesting)
The only solution (Score:3, Funny)
2 - find responsible parties
3 - kill them
4 - repeat until spam stops.
I could not be happier. (Score:3, Insightful)
too many people put up with it. too many people tolerate it. Companies would not engage in spam, if they did not believe it was profitable.
If the spam armageddon described in this article *does* come (and I'm feverishly praying it will) - then a critical mass of people will finally get fed up and do something about it.
Not something ineffective like the national do not call list, or the can-spam act.
Something effective.
Blood will flow.
It will be glorious.
Re:Cell Phone (Score:2)
Those scumbags aren't above using wardialers.
Re:Cell phones -- missing the point (Score:4, Insightful)
You're missing the point here. The cell phone companies want you to use your phone. You don't have unlimited cell phone service. The more minutes you use, the more you pay. This is to their advantage, because where else are you going to go?
Re:IP Blocking? (Score:4, Informative)
While this isn't so bad if the telemarketer is running their own analog-to-IP telephone adaptor/IAD/Asterisk etc., it is quite problematic if the gateway belongs to a major carrier for a large exchange (say, for example, in NYC.)
PSTN carriers can't risk common carrier status by filtering or denying access to telemarketers (e.g. they can't operate like an ISP with an AUP against spamming) so they can't stop the traffic themselves. And you could be cutting off connectivity to large portions of the PSTN every time you apply a filter. Even if it worked for awhile, eventually you would notice severe end-to-end connectivity problems.