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Telemarketers to Target Cell Phones 452

Posted by CmdrTaco from the brace-for-impact dept.
sik puppy writes "According to this article on msnbc, telemarketers may soon be targeting cell phones." The article discusses how some of these will be accidental, but others will be in response to things like the do-not-call registry.
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Telemarketers to Target Cell Phones More

Telemarketers to Target Cell Phones

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  • Who pays me... (Score:5, Insightful)

    by drpickett ( 626096 ) on Tuesday October 14, 2003 @10:38AM (#7209353)
    ...for the squandering of my incoming minutes?

    • Re:Who pays me... (Score:3, Interesting)

      by ebh ( 116526 ) *
      I thought telemarketing to cellphones was illegal for exactly that reason, the same as junk faxes.
    • The telemarketers do, since you will be able to sue them the same as you would sue someone sending junk faxes. In both cases the *marketer is using resources you pay for to deliver their message without your prior consent.

    • Re:Who pays me... (Score:2, Interesting)

      by TheLinuxSRC ( 683475 )
      I totally agree. My cell phone is not free. Are they going to reimburse me? Highly unlikely.

      I am so sick of being a "demographic" and of being marketed to. Don't they realize that by doing this it only inflames me with regard to whatever bullshit they are selling? I go *OUT OF MY WAY* to avoid products that are sold in this manner. Fuck marketers and their respective companies.

      And no, this is not meant as a troll.
    • Use the "caller pays" thingy, and then talk to them for hours, ask them detailed questions about all of their products.
    • Just tow days ago , I got a call on my cell.
      The caller-ID was shown as Private Number, and when I answered, It was a pre-recorded message which went something like this.....

      Hi this call will not cost you anything and is brought to you by XYZ the makers of ABCD. If you would like to proceed, press 1 on your dial pad

      At which point I hung up. If this starts happening frequently then will be very annoying.

  • anyways, it's a good thing I listed my cell phone number in the do not call registry too then....
    • Probably they will get the number from there :)
      • Probably they will get the number from there

        Absolutely, some will. It's a lot like a "remove" link on spam, which sometimes is used to confirm addresses. Once the number is exposed on a list, some will use a list for something other than its intended purpose.

        I listed my home phone number, since it was already getting bombarded with phonespam. In eight years of owning a cellphone (not the same one for all eight years, thankfully), I've never (knocking on wood) gotten a telemarketing call on my cellphon
    • I suddenly started getting telemarketing calls on my cellphone as well after the DNC registry went into affect. My cell number was subsequently registered to the list as well.

  • Been getting SMS spam for years already (Score:3, Informative)

    by hattig ( 47930 ) on Tuesday October 14, 2003 @10:39AM (#7209361) Journal
    In the UK we've been getting SMS spam messages for years already.

    Of course, the cost of sending these messages means that you don't get many, and they won't come with a 150KB attachment for no good reason.

    • Re:Been getting SMS spam for years already (Score:4, Informative)

      by Teun ( 17872 ) on Tuesday October 14, 2003 @11:55AM (#7210416)
      A big difference between Europe and the US is that in Europe you don't pay (call minutes) for incoming calls or messages (as long as you are within your own country).
  • Call me on a cellphone so that *I* have to pay to be hassled by them? Fuck that. I'd have them in small claims court the next day.

  • New feature set (Score:2, Interesting)

    by Lord Grey ( 463613 ) *
    How long will it take before the cell phone manufacturers start putting some decent anti-spam-like features into their phones? I, for one, would love to have blacklisting and whitelisting options for inbound calls and text messsages. A SpamCop-like consensus voting and temporary blacklisting would be cool, too.

    Nokia? Motorola? Anyone listening?

    • I've got a Nokia 3360 CACP (cheap ass cell phone). It has that very feature. It's under "Settings | Security Settings | Call Restrictions" (or 4-5-1-1). You can restrict incoming and outgoing calls alike.

      Nothing regarding text messages, though.
    • It's a good point. The main difference between bells and cell-providers is that bells are not competing within a given area, while I have to choose between two or three (or even more) cell-providers. So, once at least one cell-provider will give me any kind of anti-spam protection - the rest of them will have to do the same or they will begin losing customers.

    • You can already do this.

      Nokia 3360: Restrict Incoming Calls [nokiahowto.com]

  • Ha! (Score:5, Informative)

    by TheBeardIsRed ( 695409 ) * on Tuesday October 14, 2003 @10:39AM (#7209372)
    (Pardon My referencing of the US code, i'm not a lawyer and thus don't know the proper way to cite things)

    Title 47, Chapter 5, Subchapter II, Part I, Section 227, Article b, Item 1, Subitem B, Instance iii

    It shall be unlawful for any person within the United States to make any call (other than a call made for emergency purposes or made with the prior express consent of the called party) using any automatic telephone dialing system or an artificial or prerecorded voice to any telephone number assigned to a paging service, cellular telephone service, specialized mobile radio service, or other radio common carrier service, or any service for which the called party is charged for the call;

    Thus anyone using an auto-dialer (i.e. 99% of telemarketers) are inviolation of the law and subject to a $500 fine in small claims court.

    See these for more info:
    http://www4.law.cornell.edu/uscode/47/227.html [cornell.edu]
    http://slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=03/05/05/116238 &mode=thread&tid=126&tid=111&tid=99&tid=12 3 [slashdot.org]
    http://www.panix.com/~eck/telemarket.html [panix.com]
    • Thus anyone using an auto-dialer (i.e. 99% of telemarketers) are inviolation of the law and subject to a $500 fine in small claims court.

      Not to mention the hordes of pitchfork- and torch-wielding cellphone users that would seek such telemarketers out and have them drawn and quartered...
    • [quote , emphasis by me]
      It shall be unlawful for any person within the United States to make any call (other than a call made for emergency purposes or made with the prior express consent of the called party) using any automatic telephone dialing system or an artificial or prerecorded voice to any telephone number assigned to a paging service, cellular telephone service, specialized mobile radio service, or other radio common carrier service, or any service for which the called party is charged for the cal
    • Comment removed based on user account deletion
    • I suspect that they'll get around that by displaying the phone number and name on the telemarketers display with a button labeled "dial". This is not automatic, such as those systems that dial 4 or more numbers, and only connects the first one to answer, disconnecting the other three.

      But I wonder - what about ad supported phones? You are given the phone, and it has gps support with a color display. You agree to receive a number of marketting ads a week, whether by display, voice call, etc, which don't
      • I'd read they did something like this in italy, where the cellphone/minutes are free, but whenever you dial someone, you first listen to a ~30 second ad before it connects you.

        This works much better, since if ppl called me, then our conversation was interrupted by an ad, I'd just hang up and stop talking to that person via phone.
    • Unfortunately, this law only covers systems in which no human gets on the line, where the system just plays a recorded message.

      If a human is making the call, even if all they are doing is pushing a "Next Call" button, then this law doesn't count.

      Predictive dialer systems are in a grey area.
    • But telemarketers who dial themselves and don't use prerecorded voices can call cell-phones as much as they like (assuming the number they are calling is not on the Do Not Call list).

      I would expect the industry to move away from auto-dialers and just have the operators prompted as to what number to manually dial.
    • Title 47, Chapter 5, Subchapter II, Part I, Section 227, Article b, Item 1, Subitem B, Instance iii

      Yes, that's true for now. But look closely at this part:

      made with the prior express consent of the called party

      You can bet your ass that they will turn any contract riders to receive marketing as an "express consent" to accept incoming cell calls. These riders are frickin everywhere.

  • IANAL, but I thought it was illegal to cold-call a cell phone, because the owner often gets charged for incoming and outgoing calls.

    What are the telemarketers going to do, send SMS messages?
  • I already took the precaution of also registering my cell phone numbers, despite the laws already in place protecting them from these vultures.

    I already scared the hell out of some local company that was making calls (low-scale, probably just a couple secretaries doing it). When I mentioned the fines, they apologized profusely and got off the phone as quickly as possible.
    • It's a pity you didn't take them for $500 anyway. Although they apologised to you I bet they just carried straight on with all the other numbers on their list. The only way to make these people understand is to hurt their wallets.
      • A relative of mine is good friends with a lawyer who likes to do this with illegal faxes.

        He has everyone he knows send him their illegal faxes. They send a certified letter to the sender with, in proper legal-ese, a demand for $1500, next day by courier, or else a suit will be filed for the $500 plus all legal fees (which is always significantly more). Something like 90% respond with a check. The lawyer pockets $500, and the fax recipient get sthe other $1500.

        How's that for some profit? $1500 for the
  • i thought telemarkets calling cell phones was already banned? or is this one of those "they can call you if you've done previous business with them in the last year?"
    • ok. after I RTFA'd, I see what's going on. The impending number-portability regulation can allow what used to be residential phone numbers to become cell phone numbers, and if that person didnt sign up for the DNC list, they could (more likely will) receive telemarketing calls. The story is about there not being any kind of list or something from the FCC allowing telemarketers to look up whether a number is or isn't a cell phone.
  • Well, this kind of thing will happen when you have a system where you have to pay for the airtime to receive calls. In the UK, we pay nothing to receive calls on mobile (excepting ongoing costs of the line rental of course), it costs more for a caller to call a mobile number than it does to call a land line, which is how it should be. If someone wants to call me on my mobile, I expect them to pay for it, especially if they're trying to sell something.

    The system in the UK also relies on mobile numbers being

  • Simple remedy... (Score:2, Insightful)

    by 91degrees ( 207121 )
    Ban telemartketing unless people explicitely opt-in.

    • Ban telemartketing unless people explicitely opt-in

      The problem with that is, the bottle is open and the genie is has stolen the stopper... Telemarketers aren't going to let go that easily. They've got cash and backing to lobby against any legislation that might limit them. Why else do you think the national Do Not Call list is being challenged in court?

      Telemarketers believe they have a Constitutionally-granted right to call anybody, anytime, to sell stuff (freedom of speech), and that fact that you'v

  • I don't think it's a very savory concept, but what's the alternative: they all just dissipate and find other jobs that are nonexistant in our economy?

    This was not a good time to implement a nationwide do-not-call list. Although maybe I don't care about this so much because I don't have a cell phone and don't intend to get one (they may or may not give you brain cancer, but everybody I know that has one has no attention span anymore.)

    So long as they keep away from faxes, and keep the pitches to a minimu

    • What are telemarketers contributing to society? Why do we need to keep them employed? It is an unfortunate side-effect of our screwey economic system that everyone must be employed somewhere even if they are not doing anything productive.
    • That's a very good alternative. Telemarketing is wrong, naturally I'd rather see people out of a job than doing it. In just the same way as I'd rather people didn't sell crack in my neighbourhood even if it was their only way of making money.
      Just because it's a way of making money doesn't make it right, regardless of what the Reagan/Thatcherites would have you believe.
    • Telemarketers sell useless shit to people who don't know any better. They are already not performing anything worthwhile. The only difference after they're out of a job is that the idiots who buy stuff from them will be keeping their money instead of giving it to parasites. Total economic impact: zero.
    • I heard that murder for hire was a very lucrative business to be in. Maybe we should make it legal because of the bad economy too. I mean really the Mafia is just doing its job right? Doesn't really matter who else gets harmed ...

      I know tele-marketing isn't quite the same, but its the same principle. People disagree with it. They don't like it. They want it to stop. This being a country run 'by the people and for the people' when the majority of people stand up for something (like they have by signing up f

  • New Script (Score:5, Funny)

    by Aggrazel ( 13616 ) <aggrazel@gmail.com> on Tuesday October 14, 2003 @10:43AM (#7209433) Journal
    Guy: Hello?

    Telemarketer: Hello! I am running for Mayor in the City of Ritzville, so this is a political call exempt from the Do Not Call list. I am running for mayor on the platform of keeping our wonderful vacation timeshares as cheap as possible for the good bargain hunters. In fact, you can get this beutiful timeshare right on the beach for less than you might think. Would you like to hear more about these wonderful deals that happen to be in the city I'm running for mayor in? If so, press 1 to talk to a representative now!

  • Hmmm (Score:2)

    by jd ( 1658 )
    That may be illegal, in some States, as cell phones often charge for incoming calls.

    What will happen, though, is that cell phones'll start being registered on the "Do Not Call" list, which'll push the total number of phones registered into the hundreds of millions.

    Far from profiting by such a tactic, that might well be enough to convince the courts that telemarketers have gone too far. Especially if the tactic interferes with medical staff's paging systems and phone systems.

    One death that can be attri

    • Can cell phones even be registered on the DNC list? I thought only landlines and similar phone systems could be registered, not cell phones. If they can, though, then by all means let's register our cell phones and show that the telemarketers are not going to get us that way either!
      • There's no way of telling (unless you know the exchange shifts post-overlay for 617) which local number is a cell and which is a landline. The exchanges *were* active here before the 617/781 split, and with a badly programmed auto-dialer, it's easy to screw up.

        With the portability law coming into effect, it will be impossible to tell for anyone whether your target is landline or mobile. So I went ahead and registered both landlines and the SO's cell phone. If I ever stop being too important to have a ce
  • Wow, telemarketers really, REALLY know how to motivate people to do things. Like having them band together to permanently ban the notion that commercial speech is equivalent to free speech by individuals and is protected by the First Amendment in the same way.

    RIAA, you'll have to work harder if you want to take back the "Incredibly Stupid Commercial Entity Trying to Alienate Their Theoretical Audience" prize!

    • Re:Not only annoying, but costly too! (Score:4, Funny)

      by jd ( 1658 ) <`imipak' `at' `yahoo.com'> on Tuesday October 14, 2003 @10:53AM (#7209575) Homepage Journal
      Suggest a small correction. They pull this stunt on a sizable fraction of those who've already registered all their other phones on the DNC list, and commercial speech may well be scrapped from the First Amendment entirely.


      Court in session, Glib Telemarketers are appealing a ruling that they can't call cell phones. Aide to judge notifies the judge that there's a call on his ultra-private emergencies only cellphone. Judge retires to his chambers to take the call...


      Voice: "Hello. I'm Sodum, and I'm calling on behalf of Glib Telemarketers. Would you be interested in one of our free unlimited-credit credit cards today?"


      Judge returns to court and sentances everyone at Glib Telemarketing to a slow and painful death.

      • > Judge returns to court and sentances everyone at Glib Telemarketing to a slow and painful death.
        >
        >What does it take to make our world come alive? What does it take to make us sing? (SoM // Vision Thing)

        Best juxtaposition of .sig and post ever.

        One million points of light, each one a telemarketer from Glib Telemarketing being burnt at the stake. That's my Vision Thing, and the next time there's a recall election, I'm running for Governor on it!

    • Like having them band together to permanently ban the notion that commercial speech is equivalent to free speech by individuals and is protected by the First Amendment in the same way.

      It's not about commercial speech vs individual speech. Speech is still free, the First Amendment guarantees you the right to speak, it does not guarantee you the right to an audience. If you knock at my door to exercise your free speech rights and tell me you think my house is ugly, by all means, go ahead. I will then exe
  • These will only start because of the FCC's push for number portability, not the do-not-call list.

    What I'd like to know is, what recourse is available to those people who actually switch their landlines to cell. Do the telemarketers *have* to remove your number if you tell them its a cell? Can you sue for reimbursement if they don't?

  • The solution may be to get a rabbit (Score:5, Funny)

    by ssclift ( 97988 ) on Tuesday October 14, 2003 @10:46AM (#7209471)

    ... or at least Bun Bun from today's Sluggy Freelance. [sluggy.com]

  • Why not have the "do not call" list apply to the person and not the number? That way, you can't call a name on the list (my name will be 'home owner').
  • Unless I missed something, the TCPA is still valid law, and it explicitly prohibits telemarketing of cellular phones, or any service where you have to pay by the minute.

    (47CFR64.1200)
    (a) No person may:
    (1) Initiate any telephone call (other than a call made for
    emergency purposes or made with the prior express consent of the called
    party) using an automatic telephone dialing system or an artificial or
    prerecorded voice,
    (iii) To any telephone number assigned to a paging service, cellular telephone ser
  • 1) Put into their terms of service that the user agrees to use the phone company as an agent for their $500 Title 47 small claims court actions against telemarketers, giving the phone company a 50% cut of any awarded damages

    2) Give users a special dial code to call immediately after receiving a telemarketing call, like you can use *57 for harassing calls

    3) Deliver the telemarketing companies a weekly invoice for their calls to cell phones

    4) No, this isn't the stupid joke you thought it was, move along.
  • If they thought they'd get an angry spew when calling me at dinner, I can't even imagine what torrent of profanity would exit my mouth if they called while I was on my way home after work stuck in traffic.

    Offtopic: my favorite new telemarketer trick, which has seemed to help reduce my call volume. Pick up, and as soon as they go into their pitch, put the phone down on the counter, but don't hang up. Don't pick it up again until they've given up on you. Sorta pointless, but hilarious. I haven't tried t

  • This won't fly (Score:4, Interesting)

    by Todd Knarr ( 15451 ) on Tuesday October 14, 2003 @10:54AM (#7209580) Homepage

    This idea won't fly. The reason is simple: money. On landlines it costs nothing to receive a call, so consumers can complain but that's about it as far as the telephone carriers are concerned. Cel phones and SMS are a different story. When a telemarketer calls a cel phone or sends a text message, the phone's owner can point to a line on his bill and say "This unwanted call/message cost me $X.". Now the phone owner has proof of an actual dollar amount to go with his complaint, and he can demand reimbursement. If the phone carrier reimburses, it's going to turn telemarketing into a cost for the carriers and they're going to do something about it. If phone carriers refuse to reimburse, we'll see something like the junk-fax law passed ASAP. One way or another, when the telemarketers start generating provable costs to the recipients of their calls there's going to be a major backlash against the telemarketers.

    Telemarketers, take note: if you won't compromise, if you insist that it's either no limits at all or nothing, you may find that the rest of us consider giving you nothing at all a perfectly acceptable outcome. :)

    • I tried this approach with a local newspaper (Indianapolis Star (Gannette...)) when they kept repeatedly calling my celphone and I told them on at least one occasion not to call me again.

      So when I went over the limit on my minutes that month, I fired off an e-mail to every single address I could find associated with the newspaper complaining, and requesting compensation.

      I finally got a response; a manager made sure that my number was removed, and offered compensation for the amount that I went over on my
    • When a telemarketer calls a cel phone or sends a text message, the phone's owner can point to a line on his bill and say "This unwanted call/message cost me $X."

      Is that true? The originating number shows up on your bill? Is it the same on landlines? Kinda kicks caller-id-blocking into touch...

  • If telemarketers were to eat up cell time and start costing people money, I'm sure a class action suit could be brought against major telemarketing companies for damages. If Big Blue can be sued for vandalism for painting penguins on sidewalks, telemarketers can be sued for wasting our money selling us products we don't want.
  • ...if I can sue a telemarketer if I crash my car in high trafic on my way to work because of his call, and all my friends who have my number were told not to call during that time ("because I have difficulties with splitting my attention")
  • Comment removed based on user account deletion
  • I'm sorry, but "service provider" does NOT mean providing information to telemarketers. If my cell provider starts encouraging people to waste my minutes, then I'm going to stop paying for them.

  • Wow! Avoid plans with free incoming calls... (Score:3, Interesting)

    by dpbsmith ( 263124 ) on Tuesday October 14, 2003 @11:01AM (#7209702) Homepage
    I believe there are some... and an increasing number that give you a certain number of (prepaid) incoming minutes that are included in the plan.

    Don tinfoil hat: is it possible that the cellular companies instituted these plans precisely in order to be telemarketer-friendly?

  • You can register cell #s on the do-not-call list (Score:3, Informative)

    by Arjuna Theban ( 143564 ) on Tuesday October 14, 2003 @11:03AM (#7209731)
    I don't think they get the point that the national do-not-call registry allows cell phone numbers to be registered.

    My cell number was registered on the list as soon as it was started. Telemarketers would have a nice $11k fine if they called me on it.

    -bm
  • I don't think most people realize that those recorded ads are already against federal law. According to the CODE OF FEDERAL REGULATIONS: RESTRICTIONS ON TELEMARKETING AND TELEPHONE SOLICITATION [consumerwatchdog.org]:

    It is illegal to "Initiate any telephone call to any residential line using an artificial or prerecorded voice to deliver a message without the prior express consent of the called party...."

    Add to that that the call was made to a cell phone:

    "No person or entity may...Initiate any telephone call (other than a call
  • ...at least here in Alberta, this happens already. When I got my cell phone I had a telemarketer call the next day. When I called up my phone company to discuss this, I was told there's nothing preventing them from doing so.

    However, I've had my phone for nearly a year and have received perhaps 5 calls in total. Obviously people aren't too happy about being called on their cell phones and are probably not going to buy anything. Even the people who would normally buy from a telemarketer aren't going to b
  • I'm glad I went ahead and put my cellphone number on the Do Not Call list when I signed up. Sometimes foresight really does pay off.

    On a similar subject, folks might find today (Tuesday)'s Sluggy Freelance [sluggy.com] amusing...
  • This article is absolutely pointless.

    First, they will not be 'targeting' cellphones.

    Second, they will not be calling phone numbers that are in the Do-Not-Call registry. They CAN'T.

    Third, E-911 does not provide address information to telemarketers, it is a system where CALLING OUT from a cellphone allows the 911 provider to get the location of the phone. The cellphone provider's location-tracking system is not part of E-911, but is a requirement for it. And if the provider is going to use advertising t
  • Well, gee, I guess it's a good thing I registered my cell number with the do-not-call registry.

  • Do Not Call... (Score:3, Informative)

    by LightningTH ( 151451 ) on Tuesday October 14, 2003 @11:19AM (#7209905)
    On the front page of the Do Not Call [donotcall.gov] list states

    You can register your home and
    mobile phone numbers for free


    I dont plan on having any telemarketers calling my cell.

  • Their restraint is our protection? (Score:3, Interesting)

    by EnlightenmentFan ( 617608 ) on Tuesday October 14, 2003 @11:22AM (#7209940) Homepage Journal
    For now, consumers' primary defense against wireless telemarketing will be the restraint of direct marketers. "The level of annoyance and antagonism [for wireless customers] would be extremely high, and our members realize that it's really not a good marketing tool," says the DMA's Conway.

    Yes, and we know companies never use marketing tools that they fear we won't like. That's why webvertisers never use spam, pop-unders, stupid animated banners that cover the page....

    How many millions did X-10 make from pop-unders? As they chuckled all the way to the bank, I somehow doubt they were shedding tears about my "annoyance and antagonism."

  • I got a cold call on my cell phone the other day from Sprint, my own service provider. They informed me that I would not be billed for the call, and asked if I would be interested in participating in a special offer of some sort. I declined and hung up.

    Based on my reading of the relevant US code, providing the airtime for the call at no charge to me does not mean it's okay for them to telemarket to me. However, the code only seems to apply if they contacted my phone using the phone number -- if they est

  • Track the unsolicited calls that were made to you and bill the agency that is responsible for your now unusable minutes. Better yet, if the wireless providers were to reimburse you for your lost minutes and then bill the responsible agencies to recover, we could possibly see the end of telemarketers.

    This would work only if the phone companies didn't already pay the telemarketers for their services in marketing. Then we probably wouldn't see the providers charging the telemarketers.

  • Why is this an issue? (Score:3, Insightful)

    by CAIMLAS ( 41445 ) on Tuesday October 14, 2003 @12:08PM (#7210528)
    IIRC, cellular numbars are relegated to seperate 'precincts'. At least around here, you can tell which numbers are cell numbers and which are landlines by the second set of 3 numbers: 250, 251, 257, etc. for cell phones, 252, 253 for land lines. This might simply be due to the fact that seperate companies have control of these numbers, though.

    What I wonder is how companies get cell phone numbers in the first place, to 'accidentially' call. Cell phones are all unlisted for a reason. This means they were either sold the numbers by the cell company, or they're randomly calling folks.

    Going through numbers in random/sequential order is illigal, IIRC. It's considered right up there with prank phone calls and the like, which (again, IIRC) you can be prosecuted for if found out. The problem is, you can rarely find out precisely who called you. Phone networks don't exactly have whois. That, and the only realistic way to do something like this is a class-action suit. That involves a lot of dirt digging by many people - something that isn't practical in the least.

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