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Comment by kragen | Hacker News Reader

Is there a list? I'd like to know if my SIP provider is on it, ideally before it gets shut down.

Aha, the list was linked from the original URL, but dang unfortunately changed it to the plain text news release https://docs.fcc.gov/public/attachments/DOC-408083A1.txt which doesn't link to the list. The original URL was https://www.fcc.gov/document/fcc-could-block-over-2400-provi..., which links to https://docs.fcc.gov/public/attachments/DA-24-1235A1.pdf, which lists the providers that will be shut down. And I'm happy to see that my SIP provider isn't on it.

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TIL there are thousands of voip/telco providers. I cannot believe there are so many. How do they all stay in business, or get their customers?

Robocalls. That said, they're likely "virtual" providers, which are in turn enabled by "Mobile Virtual Network Providers", companies that sell telco-provider-as-a-service, so that a virtual provider only needs to focus on sales, marketing, first call customer support, and legal liability but not the technical nitty gritty. I hope the FCC goes after these MVNOs enabling them next.

(source: wikipedia and I worked in a small segment of the mobile network operator market for a short while)

I wonder what fraction of economic activity passes through these "wrapper companies".

Many of these small voip providers the voip service is a small portion of their overall business. They may be a small ISP, reselling voip as an add on to internet services. Or they may be a small MSP marketing services to businesses in their area, and VOIP is just one small part of their overall package. If you are already marketing to the customer, providing customer service, billing, and even onsite support, why not add an additional service like VOIP, even if it alone isn't all that profitable? Even if you are only breaking even, having the service in house can save you time and money troubleshooting when a customer call you up and says they are having problems making phone calls and their third party VoIP service support is blaming the network...

Same here.

I have some questions 1) are these telcos effectively pass-thru operators for actual spammers ? in other words, just a paper entity working with 1-2 customers ?

2) Do these VOIP providers act as resellers for the big telcos ? If yes, how does the telco contracting/onboarding fail so hard at screening for bad actors as potential customers (is there a law like KYC for them at all ?)

3) Finally, once onboarded don't the big telcos have some incentive to boot bad actors from their busy networks ?

You can become one yourself this week if you install Asterisk on an obsolete PC in your closet and plug one or more phone lines into a "telephony interface card". You don't have to stay in business.

> How do they all stay in business, or get their customers?

They are created/supported by the robocallers.

And it's been going on for years. Years ago, when I had a landline, I started to notice that a lot of spam calls came from the same area codes and prefixes. A quick trip over to telcodata.us showed that all of these prefixes/thousands blocks were assigned to the same company, which had a web storefront as a wireless provider but didn't really provide cellular service. Apparently, nothing has changed.

ETA: Whew, my SIP provider isn't on the list.

By pushing new lines on you even if you don't need them, creating very low expectations for technical service, and automating away customer service at every turn.

I feel like there is a shadow cartel where all telcos agree to suck as much as possible so there's no real incentive to switch. Also aggregators love re-bills where you pay them for another provider's invoice but they can't do anything service-wise on it.

At my work (in charge of 140 Windows laptops/iPhones) the only way T-Mobile would give me a deal on 30 new iPhones was by selling me 50 new SIMs for lines I told them I absolutely didn't need. I'm turning those off now. Don't even get me started on Granite or Telepacific, each of which make Comcast and AT&T look like shining examples of greatness.

My local ISP offers VOIP.

For a long time the area was serviced by AT&T, who probably started with phone lines and then progressed over time to dial up and then more modern cable / broadband. They probably bundled in home phone service for many years.

When the local ISP built out all their gigabit fiber infrastructure they probably felt they had to offer some kind of phone service to compete, and went with VOIP since they weren't going to build out a whole telephone network infrastructure. I'd bet most people don't use it, but they need to offer it to be viable for certain older customers that don't want to give up their home phones.

I briefly set up a home phone on the provided VOIP, just for fun and nostalgia, but it was pretty annoying with sometimes getting disconnected and needing a manual power cycle to reconnect so I stopped using it.

Maybe with robocalls?

And mine is on the list .. and it's the only phone number I have for all my banks and other accounts. Looks like I'm frakd. And no, I'm not a robocaller, in fact I never used this phone to call or text anything, just to receive texts.

The US has number portability - you should be able to switch now and keep your number

However having said that, I'm not sure it will keep working if the original provider goes bust. If it's the same as in the UK, under the hood the implementation requires the original owner of the number range to do forwarding. So it's worth checking if the owner of the range of numbers containing your number - often a different company - is on the list

(Edited to add) Actually it looks like the US has a centralised implementation: https://10xpeople.com/blog/switching-carriers-and-retaining-...

The article says "Removal from the database means other providers will be prohibited from accepting call traffic from these providers."

So perhaps inbound calls and inbound texts will be fine?

Hope so very much.

If they end up on this list they will shut down shortly after, and you better find out if it will be possible to transfer your number if that happens.

I would contact the provider and ask them their intentions, and if you are not satisfied leave while you still can.

Thanks for linking the list! I'm seeing "Sangoma U.S., Inc." in it, which might apply to quite a few people & companies.

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