Hacker News Reader

Comment by zackmorris | Hacker News Reader

Since caller id was implemented so poorly:

https://www.onsip.com/blog/how-caller-id-works-why-it-might-...

Maybe it would be nice if we had something kind of like a CAPTCHA, where an app on your phone would say "please dial <random-number> and say your name to complete your call" and the person would have to dial it and say who they are to talk to you.

Totally knee-jerk idea I realize, but I literally get 10 SCAM LIKELY calls for every real call now, rendering my phone almost unusable. Huh, I just did a quick search and it looks like it might already be possible to install an app to do something like this. Anyone know if this works?

https://support.apple.com/en-us/HT207099

View on HN

It's insanely easy for a program to recognize individual digits and then type them out. Saying a name would also be trivial (recorded, generated, etc). Audio captchas have existed for a while, they have been an alternative for a long time, and they are even more annoying than images.

What we need is an abuse prevention system involving authentication. You can get reported for robo calls, and if enough different accounts you called have reported you, you get reviewed/banned/throttled. Let's not reinvent the wheel, it's been the standard way to deal with spam all over the web. But it requires rethinking the way we use phones, and a whole new infrastructure. It also brings some anonymity concerns but half-measures are just an arms race.

I think you are right about this. The previous response said they received 10 spam calls for every 1 real one. I'm probably about the same. My email spam isn't even close to that. 50 to 1, inbox, maybe?

This situation is far more dire for the telco's and their debt holders than they are catching on to. The telephone number, portable or not, is what anchors their customers. When it is gone, you've got a commodity.

say your name to complete your call" and the person would have to dial it and say who they are to talk to you.

I'm not sure why you're being downvoted for this. My in-laws have this feature on their landline from their local telco. Completely annoying, but I don't want to talk to them anyway.

My mother has this feature (in UK). The first time you call, it will send you to the voicemail and ask you to state who you are. Then she gets a notification and can listen to the message. If she phones you back, the number you are calling from is whitelisted. I think she can press something else to blacklist you, otherwise you stay in the grey zone and will always go to the voicemail. I think she has had a couple of people not leave a message several times and eventually blocked them where she would have been completely happy to speak to them if she only knew who they were..

Be careful calling back. I had a friend who called back what turned out to be a Wangiri Scam http://www.three.co.uk/hub/earth-wangiri-scam/

The call-back cost him ~$4 in long distance charges.

Reply on news.ycombinator.com