500
This will be as effective as the do not call registry and CAN-SPAM. Which is to say, it will be a sick joke that won't do shit by design.
I remember signing up for the Do Not Call registry. I got more spam robo calls after signing up than I did before signing up for it. It was a joke.
Hey everyone! Here's a list of phone numbers! Real, legitimate phone numbers! Anyone can view this list of phone numbers, for free!
But whatever you do, DON'T call anyone on this list, OK??
CAN-SPAM is effective for legitimate businesses with something to lose. Several times I've ended up on a list with an unsubscribe link that doesn't work (looking at you, Walgreens). I contact their support, and if they don't do anything I send them an email demanding they remove me and cc'ing the federal trade commission and my states attorney general. Hasn't failed yet.
How about just ban robocalls outright?
Honestly what does ban mean here? A fine if and when they do something about it? Maybe?
Here's an idea... why not ban all robo-calls?
Because there are legitimate reasons for some robo calls. Appointment reminders and confirmations, school weather closure announcements, two-factor login verification, etc.
How about ban non-opt in robocalls?
You can do all this things without robo calls. There are no robo calls in Germany for example.
I thought I lived in a pretty backwards part of Germany but your corner must be extremely off the grid!
To just name one example in Germany: Verification via robo call in WhatsApp.
Oh, I genuinely didn't know there are robo calls in Germany, never encountered them - always used sms or other kinds of verification. My bad.
Today, history was made. For the first time someone politely admitted they were wrong on the internet
It would be a good trade. Lose the few semi-useful legitimate ones to get rid of the overwhelming majority which are malicious scammers and conservative dickbags.
No there isn't.
Text if school is cancelled. Throw 2fa out the window. Phone numbers are not identity. Text appointment reminders. Literally nothing needs a robo voice that isn't better as text.
What if you’re blind
Then you clearly don't matter to Mango.
Blind people use special assistive software on their phones so they can hear text
Radio. Text to speech. Having someone who cares about you.
You want your doctor to broadcast your appointment reminders over the radio?
My doctor can afford to call or text or have a secretary do so.
In 2024, have a human call for reminders for every client every single day for every appointment… yeah right. Enjoy that while it lasts.
If you don't have the time to call all of your patients, you don't have the time to provide medical care to them.
You'll actually have a lot of time to provide medical care to your patients when you don’t have to waste all that time calling them for no reason when that can be easily automated.
Secretary
Doctors don’t have secretaries, they have medical assistants, and medical billing and coding. Both of which have better things to do than make appointment reminder calls all day when it can be easily automated.
Shows what you know.
Anything? Yup.
Phone numbers actually can be an identity, but generally that's just business numbers. There's also a lot of phone numbers that aren't cell phones and can't get texts. It's a lot easier and cheaper for companies to design one system. Depending on the company, they'll still do text/email reminders for things. Old people like phone calls, so companies need to know their audience too. Again, cheaper to build a single system, so that tends to be the default.
Source: I design call centers for a living, personally done probably 200+ projects over the years, in banking, insurance, retail, transportation, state/local govt, etc.
Absolutely not. I can't use my Amazon account because of this stupid shit.
iirc, they are banned... to cell phones, with very limited exceptions.
but that relies on honest callers, and sufficient resources being available to adequately enforce.
I’m sure they’ll expend the effort to track the offenders down and slap them on the wrist.
Unless they're evil radical leftist Democrats, those Marxist-Leninist Antifa communist fascist socialists. Then they'll be hanged.
MAGAts get a wrist slap.
But deceiving people for money is fine? Why this one stipulation? Should just be outright illegal to use deep fake anything to deceive for personal gain, profit, or to hurt others.
Is this like how the FCC banned robocalls and ensured that a national do not call list is respected?
Oh boy, we're saved /s
To be fair, I don't think most robocalls these days aren't domestic in origin
Fine? They will be happy to pay the fine if it means they can fool thousands of voters.
Fines aren't enough for this kind of behavior.
Fines are enforced with prison. It's just the portion of wealth and income that determines how much distance is between the two
Alternative title: "FCC set to make record revenue this election season!"
Unfortunately, the FCC probably doesn't have the power to do much more than fine them. It would probably take congress to pass a bill to have jail time or something.
I'm purely guessing though
Reading the article, it sounds like the FCC has enforced similar stuff before. And at up to a $23,000 fine it could add up quickly. And the precedent of previous large fines makes me think this might actually have some teeth.
I’m sure if they do catch someone that did this the fine will either be $10 or $125.
Profit from calls: $42069
Fine from calls: $2000
Gee, I wonder why people still break the law?!
Oooh that mighty governmental watchdog the FCC?! Oh man, that’s some serious stuff. The only group more deadly serious than the FCC is the FEC. Now those guys you can’t even look at sideways before they take you down.
"This infringes on advertisers constitutional right to deceive the public for personal gain based on our historical tradition of fucking the average american"-US Supreme Court Conservatives.
Robo-callers usually don't care at all what the law says. This law will do almost nothing. But it's the thought that counts.
Somebody did something about all the extended warranty calls, but yeah I'm still skeptical.
During election time there are a lot of motivated irrational people out there who are determined to have their candidate win by any means necessary since the other side is so corrupt and are already probably playing the same tricks they want to play.
Holy shit! I haven't gotten any of those in a long time. Anyone know who did something and what?
FCC issued a $300,000,000 fine to auto warranty robocallers. Damn!
this post was submitted on 08 Feb 2024
500 points (99.6% liked)
Technology
59414 readers
1162 users here now
This is a most excellent place for technology news and articles.
Our Rules
- Follow the lemmy.world rules.
- Only tech related content.
- Be excellent to each another!
- Mod approved content bots can post up to 10 articles per day.
- Threads asking for personal tech support may be deleted.
- Politics threads may be removed.
- No memes allowed as posts, OK to post as comments.
- Only approved bots from the list below, to ask if your bot can be added please contact us.
- Check for duplicates before posting, duplicates may be removed
Approved Bots
founded 1 year ago
MODERATORS