UK's BT Launches Phone to Stop Spam Phone Calls

[JMcEntegart]

Phone is response to 50,000 complaints per month about nuisance phone calls.

UK's BT Launches Phone to Stop Spam Phone Calls : Read more

 

[reprotected]

This post was obviously paid by Apple. The title of the article has the word phone with a capital "P". It may not look like much, but subliminally, your mind will slip in the "i" and will automatically read "iPhone", thus making the title look like "UK's BT Launches iPhone to Stop Spam Phone Calls", giving good word (and a lie) to an inferior-to-anything-but-Apple Apple product, article written by an editor who's name is not Zak Islam or Wolfgang Gruener. The editor must be Zak Islam, using Jane McEntegart's name to add credibility. Tricky, but nice try Apple!

 

[derekullo]

Those European iPhones look really cheap ...

 

[chewy1963]

I would love to have this kind of functionality on my land line phone here in the States.

 

[downhill911]

[citation][nom]derekullo[/nom]Those European iPhones look really cheap ...[/citation]

This US guy sounds really ...b.

 

[fnh]

Thank god for the undeveloped & unresponsive market for telemarketing over where I live.

 

[thx1138v2]

This isn't really very hard to do. There is, however, a major difference in the British and American phone companies that makes it much harder in the U.S. The British system sends the Caller ID info _before_ the first ring and the U.S. system sends the info between the 1st and 2nd rings.

A POTS (Plain Old Telephone System) modem will actually give you the caller ID info. I wrote a program to intercept it and do a lookup in a table to determine whether or not to allow the phone to keep ringing. If itis a number I want to block, the PC modem answers the call and throws a fax handshake at the caller over the phone line. After a while, they quit calling. The user interfacer shows the calling number in a list and you can double click it to add it to the list of blocked numbers.

In the U.S. though you have to get used to the first ring and if it doesn't ring a second time then the modem picked it up. Gives me a smile every time.

They used to call and interrupt my afternoon nap. That gave me the incentive to write the program. I haven't published it simply because I don't have the resources to test all the modems/operating systems/etc combinations.

I use an old computer for just that function. The phone line is the only thing that it is connected to.

Post here if you are interested. If I get enough feedback I'll look into publishing it.

 

[retrophe]

thx1138v2 I seriously want that program! I've always wanted to let them get a fax tone when they call hehe

 

[thx1138v2]

@retrophe
It only works (as far as I know) on land lines and I have no idea what it would do on VOIP.

There's another feature I forgot to mention. The phone companies around the world settled on some DTMF tones (that's what you hear when you key a number on a touch-tone phone) for universal messages. These are the tones you hear just before you get a message like "this is a disconnected or no longer working number". They use tones so the local phone company can put the message out in the local language. The tones are the same but the message is in a different language according to where you are originating the call. There are quite a few. They are known as "SIT codes" - Special Information Tones.

My program has the ability (optional) to put out the "disconnected" message tones. I've heard (but don't know for sure) that this will cause the automatic dialing machines to delete you from their database.

 

[silverblue]

I register all my phones via the Telephone Preference Service, which should stop these sorts of calls happening... shame that it doesn't in practice. Hell, even ex-directory numbers get spammed... and they never should.

 

[PreferLinux]

[citation][nom]thx1138v2[/nom]This isn't really very hard to do. There is, however, a major difference in the British and American phone companies that makes it much harder in the U.S. The British system sends the Caller ID info _before_ the first ring and the U.S. system sends the info between the 1st and 2nd rings. A POTS (Plain Old Telephone System) modem will actually give you the caller ID info. I wrote a program to intercept it and do a lookup in a table to determine whether or not to allow the phone to keep ringing. If itis a number I want to block, the PC modem answers the call and throws a fax handshake at the caller over the phone line. After a while, they quit calling. The user interfacer shows the calling number in a list and you can double click it to add it to the list of blocked numbers.In the U.S. though you have to get used to the first ring and if it doesn't ring a second time then the modem picked it up. Gives me a smile every time.They used to call and interrupt my afternoon nap. That gave me the incentive to write the program. I haven't published it simply because I don't have the resources to test all the modems/operating systems/etc combinations.I use an old computer for just that function. The phone line is the only thing that it is connected to.Post here if you are interested. If I get enough feedback I'll look into publishing it.[/citation]
That sounds really great! You really should publish it – seems like the old modems might still have some use after all!

 

[thx1138v2]

@PreferLinux: the old modems might still have some use after all!
Probably not. When I updated to Windows 7 I couldn't find drivers for my old modem so had to get another one. RE your used name, the program uses Windows API comm calls so it only works on Windows. Worse than that, I just wanted to stop the annoying calls so I slapped it together with VisualBASIC. So it wouldn't be very easy to port to other OSes.

 

[PreferLinux]

Good point Re drivers.

Still, that is fine for majority of users. Maybe I'll just have to try to write something myself though.

 

[wavesurfer]

How about we get apps for consumer complaints websites such as Callercenter.com available on our phone, too? Since these sites are filled with information about nuisance and scam callers, when a reported phone number calls, the app can just ring an alarm about the caller and display the report. With that, the recipient is alerted. And most importantly, what's nice about this idea is that the recipient will never have to pay for it or buy a new phone to stop unsolicited calls. We already have too many things we're spending money on, let this problem with the telemarketers not add to it.

 

[devBunny]

[citation][nom]reprotected[/nom]This post [article] was obviously paid by A***le.[/citation]

I think not but it could be said that the first post was posted by an a***le. ;o)

 

[virtualban]

A button to play a really loud high pitched sound on the earpiece of the other side, without anything heard on my side. That would be a good idea IMO.