2016-04-05 Solving The Junk Call Problem

For both of my cell phones, I receive far more junk ‘spam’ calls than legitimate calls.  I have reported hundreds of calls to do not call.gov, and I’ve seen no letup in the number of calls, if anything it has become worse. I believe that the telemarketing co’s get my name from a list of homeowners, because I used to get a lot of calls for home improvement.

I installed the True Caller app and it has helped.  After a few calls, a spamming number causes True Caller app to generate complaints to True Caller’s centralized database, which then tells all other users that this number has been reported as spamming.  After the user blocks the number, no more calls get through. The spammers change numbers often, so it’s not fully effective.

I was thinking about this and more ideas and thought up a solution.  This solution depends upon public availability of the calling patterns of all phone numbers, probably by area code.  The first phase of implementing this solution is to finish making this database available.  It must be available in software readable format.  The database must be updated frequently, every 24 hours or a few days.  This is so that the second phase can pinpoint the spammers before they have a chance to change numbers.

The second phase is to develop software that generates statistics for the calling pattern of every number.  This includes the number of total calls, the number and percentage of incoming and outgoing calls, the number of calls incoming and outgoing that were answered successfully.

First off, if the software finds that the actual ANI number does not match the CallerID number, something is wrong or they are violating the law. It can be assumed that the number is trying to hide, and is probably used to spam.

Then if the software can compare the number with a list of inactive or disconnected numbers.  If a match is found, and the inactive number has a high volume of outbound calls, then it is being used to send junk calls, and should be labeled as such.

This software will use this information to determine if the number is making or receiving mostly inbound or outbound calls.  The software must compare the number with a list of legitimate numbers, such as notification services of pharmacies, schools, etc.  If the number is not getting or accepting incoming calls and not on the legit number, then it should be checked for a large number of outbound calls.  If it has, it should be assumed that the number is being used to send calls that are telemarketing.

Part or all of the processing can be done within the phone system.  The results can then be made available as a service.  Otherwise the user could develop an app for the smartphone that would do some or all of the processing, and act upon the results. Also, this information could be sent as additional fields in the CallerID data.

Further analysis will narrow down the many numbers that need to be blocked, such as a large group of numbers at the same location. This will have some implications for certain users, such as those who do legal cold calling. Nonprofits are one group. But many of these use volunteers who use their own personal phones, so they would be affected minimally. This system can be implemented as a pilot test in a smaller part of the country. Once the system has been tested and results are known, then widespread deployment can be done.

Update 2016 Jul 10 – I think a short term method may work okay. The telcos would forward an incoming call to a voicemail greeting. The greeting would play “Enter password” and pause for a few seconds, then repeat “Enter password”, then pause for a few seconds, then say “Goodbye” and drop the connection. During the time this greeting is being played, if any valid DTMF digit is received, the incoming call would be forwarded to the called number. This causes the caller to be more like a human, and requires that someone be listening to the greeting.

Another Idea
Instead of listening for a valid DTMF digit, the greeting could listen for the CallerID information. If the CallerID information does not check as a valid working number, then the call would be terminated.

Update 2016 Nov 22
I think it would greatly help complainants if the FTC’s Do No Call online complaint reporting system is made more user friendly. The FTC could create an app for doing this. The app would save the complainant’s cell phone data, such as number, IMEI, name, address, date and time, and it would grab the junk caller’s number. All this would be completed for the complainant when he or she reports a complaint. The app would require a captcha to make sure it’s a real human.

The FTC would require more servers, or some kind of regulation to require phone service providers to collect, accumulate, possibly process, and forward the data to the FTC.

I think the telcos will be resistant to helping the FTC. It is in their interest to get the junk caller’s business, and judging by the number of complaints from their customers, the telcos really don’t have the customer’s satisfaction in mind. I think that of they really did, they would have long ago added services to help mitigate the negative effects of junk calls.

Thinking about it, I don’t see why the FTC would have to do this app. Any company that makes apps for phones could add this feature.

More ideas to come.

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