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I have a shell script named 'lookup' that lets me know (through twilio) the location, mobile carrier, and registered name of a phone number. I wrote it to quic

by rsync 6y ago

I have a shell script named 'lookup' that lets me know (through twilio) the location, mobile carrier, and registered name of a phone number. I wrote it to quickly identify mobile vs. non-mobile numbers that I might text - also from the command line. I won't paste the entire script here (mostly authentication and argument parsing) but the meat of it is: /usr/local/bin/curl -X GET "https://lookups.twilio.com/v1/PhoneNumbers/$number?Type=carrier&Type=caller-name" -u $accountsid:$authtoken I use this several times weekly. EDIT: by "location" I mean their mobile country code - not their actual location which, of course, you cannot get without (ab)using SS7 which is beyond the scope of twilio ...

Merman_Mike 6y ago
What does a few lookups a week cost you? Just a few cents per?
- janzer 6y ago
  According to https://www.twilio.com/lookup https://www.twilio.com/lookup 1.5 cents per lookup, would be 1 cent without the carrier information.
  - Merman_Mike 6y ago
    Thanks. I've wanted to do this. Didn't know if there was some account overhead or other fees.
fy20 6y ago
In countries which have number portability this may not always be right. For example my phone number returns Vodafone, which was the carrier it was originally assigned to 15 years ago, but I've been on other networks for over a decade.
- usr1106 6y ago
  When Finland got number portability some 15 years ago it also got a free look-up service to see the real operator of every number. This was required for price transparency. Calling within your own network can be cheaper than to a competitor and you should be able to know so before making the call. Not sure how other countries have handled that. The US had the different approach, callee pays for the mobile part. Have not looked into the issue for a decade...
hadrien01 6y ago
Where do they get the names from?
- mct 6y ago
  CallerID information. There are a bunch of lookup services available for it: https://www.voip-info.org/cnam/ https://www.voip-info.org/cnam/

by rsync 6y ago

Merman_Mike 6y ago

What does a few lookups a week cost you? Just a few cents per?

janzer 6y ago
According to https://www.twilio.com/lookup https://www.twilio.com/lookup 1.5 cents per lookup, would be 1 cent without the carrier information.
- Merman_Mike 6y ago
  Thanks. I've wanted to do this. Didn't know if there was some account overhead or other fees.

fy20 6y ago

In countries which have number portability this may not always be right. For example my phone number returns Vodafone, which was the carrier it was originally assigned to 15 years ago, but I've been on other networks for over a decade.

usr1106 6y ago
When Finland got number portability some 15 years ago it also got a free look-up service to see the real operator of every number. This was required for price transparency. Calling within your own network can be cheaper than to a competitor and you should be able to know so before making the call. Not sure how other countries have handled that. The US had the different approach, callee pays for the mobile part. Have not looked into the issue for a decade...

hadrien01 6y ago

Where do they get the names from?

mct 6y ago
CallerID information. There are a bunch of lookup services available for it: https://www.voip-info.org/cnam/ https://www.voip-info.org/cnam/