5 ms·

According to the stats mentioned, robocalls are almost doubling every quarter. What is the technology that empowers this?

lighthazard 5y ago
VOIP
nexuist 5y ago
It's not really technology so much as investment; i.e. the initial wave of robocalls generate enough income that scam operators can afford to invest in more call centers, phone numbers, infrastructure, etc. Just like a real sales division in a real sales company would.
- spicybright 5y ago
  Everything is a numbers game. Taking revenue from phone companies allowing this to happen is the only way to squash it.
  - nexuist 5y ago
    Phone companies at least in the US are taking initiatives to screen spam callers, but there is only so much you can do when there are untrusted actors on the network. Truly ending robocalls would require a global treaty encompassing both hemispheres, and probably the creation of some new UN agency responsible for registering network endpoints (like ICANN). As it stands you can just move to another country that lets you hook up to their infrastructure if you are ever kicked out of your current base of operations. Given that there are still countries where you can e.g. host content that is illegal in the US or other countries, it seems unlikely such a treaty would ever make it into international law.
    - andypea 5y ago
      Spam calls are simply not a problem in many countries outside the USA, so it must be possible to tackle the problem without a global treaty.
    - viraptor 5y ago
      Untrusted / unauthenticated does not mean not traceable. You don't need an international agreement to tell companies in your country "you're responsible for not forwarding spam calls, but you also don't have to accept calls from peers with bad spam ratio". Telcos know where the spam comes from either directly or indirectly. They just don't have a good enough incentive to drop partners.
    - spicybright 5y ago
      Originally it wasn't a thing to be able to transfer phone numbers between companies if you wanted to switch providers. The industry pushed back hard saying it was too complicated, would cost them too much in development time, etc. Govt. still pushed and got it through, and now we have more control over our numbers. If they're fined significantly for forwarding spam, then you bet they'll try to find a way to stop it.
plasma 5y ago
My understanding is that all calls on the voice networks are unauthenticated, the network can’t validate if a number calling is legitimate or spoofed. In Australia, this problem exists too. Surely these large telcos can band together and add an auth layer, I’d happily reject unauthenticated calls to me.
- xupybd 5y ago
  They can but they are loosing profits as internet services swallow their market share. They won't do anything that expensive until they legally have to. The best way to fix this is to complain to your government. The tools exist https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/STIR/SHAKEN https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/STIR/SHAKEN
- spicybright 5y ago
  I actually think the majority of robocalls are from call centers with access to blocks of phone numbers they shuffle around. I wouldn't even be surprised if phone companies got kick backs in some way too. Very few people are willing to change their cell number to protest.
  - judge2020 5y ago
    I get ones with my number but the last 4 digits different - this worked the first few times I got them in 2019 but they’re definitely spoofed and I imagine they have a higher success rate than using real numbers.
- shakna 5y ago
  The protocol exists, and is in use in a number of places. [0] Whilst it isn't widely deployed yet, it is being rolled out across several nations currently - albeit very slowly. Telstra is rolling it out as well [1], but they've coupled it to their 5G efforts. [0] https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/STIR/SHAKEN https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/STIR/SHAKEN [1] https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/tackling-changing-face-our-customer-andrew-penn/ https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/tackling-changing-face-our-cu...
rhizome 5y ago
As of some years ago, Asterix, but I wouldn't be surprised if there's more specialized software nowadays.
- viraptor 5y ago
  Singling out Asterisk here is not a great example. Autocallers are pretty simple to implement over VoIP anyway. But even with POTS before call centres existed - they just required more expense up front.
ThrustVectoring 5y ago
It's less technology and more operations research. Dumping large volumes of unwanted calls into the US market can be monetized and scaled, and the response from US industry/regulators/law-enforcement is anemic enough that being fraudulent and illegal doesn't put a damper on things.

lighthazard 5y ago

VOIP

nexuist 5y ago

It's not really technology so much as investment; i.e. the initial wave of robocalls generate enough income that scam operators can afford to invest in more call centers, phone numbers, infrastructure, etc. Just like a real sales division in a real sales company would.

spicybright 5y ago
Everything is a numbers game. Taking revenue from phone companies allowing this to happen is the only way to squash it.
- nexuist 5y ago
  Phone companies at least in the US are taking initiatives to screen spam callers, but there is only so much you can do when there are untrusted actors on the network. Truly ending robocalls would require a global treaty encompassing both hemispheres, and probably the creation of some new UN agency responsible for registering network endpoints (like ICANN). As it stands you can just move to another country that lets you hook up to their infrastructure if you are ever kicked out of your current base of operations. Given that there are still countries where you can e.g. host content that is illegal in the US or other countries, it seems unlikely such a treaty would ever make it into international law.
  - andypea 5y ago
    Spam calls are simply not a problem in many countries outside the USA, so it must be possible to tackle the problem without a global treaty.
  - viraptor 5y ago
    Untrusted / unauthenticated does not mean not traceable. You don't need an international agreement to tell companies in your country "you're responsible for not forwarding spam calls, but you also don't have to accept calls from peers with bad spam ratio". Telcos know where the spam comes from either directly or indirectly. They just don't have a good enough incentive to drop partners.
  - spicybright 5y ago
    Originally it wasn't a thing to be able to transfer phone numbers between companies if you wanted to switch providers. The industry pushed back hard saying it was too complicated, would cost them too much in development time, etc. Govt. still pushed and got it through, and now we have more control over our numbers. If they're fined significantly for forwarding spam, then you bet they'll try to find a way to stop it.

plasma 5y ago

My understanding is that all calls on the voice networks are unauthenticated, the network can’t validate if a number calling is legitimate or spoofed. In Australia, this problem exists too. Surely these large telcos can band together and add an auth layer, I’d happily reject unauthenticated calls to me.

xupybd 5y ago
They can but they are loosing profits as internet services swallow their market share. They won't do anything that expensive until they legally have to. The best way to fix this is to complain to your government. The tools exist https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/STIR/SHAKEN https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/STIR/SHAKEN
spicybright 5y ago
I actually think the majority of robocalls are from call centers with access to blocks of phone numbers they shuffle around. I wouldn't even be surprised if phone companies got kick backs in some way too. Very few people are willing to change their cell number to protest.
- judge2020 5y ago
  I get ones with my number but the last 4 digits different - this worked the first few times I got them in 2019 but they’re definitely spoofed and I imagine they have a higher success rate than using real numbers.
shakna 5y ago
The protocol exists, and is in use in a number of places. [0] Whilst it isn't widely deployed yet, it is being rolled out across several nations currently - albeit very slowly. Telstra is rolling it out as well [1], but they've coupled it to their 5G efforts. [0] https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/STIR/SHAKEN https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/STIR/SHAKEN [1] https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/tackling-changing-face-our-customer-andrew-penn/ https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/tackling-changing-face-our-cu...

rhizome 5y ago

As of some years ago, Asterix, but I wouldn't be surprised if there's more specialized software nowadays.

viraptor 5y ago
Singling out Asterisk here is not a great example. Autocallers are pretty simple to implement over VoIP anyway. But even with POTS before call centres existed - they just required more expense up front.

ThrustVectoring 5y ago

It's less technology and more operations research. Dumping large volumes of unwanted calls into the US market can be monetized and scaled, and the response from US industry/regulators/law-enforcement is anemic enough that being fraudulent and illegal doesn't put a damper on things.