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Ask HN: Should you reply STOP to unwanted texts?

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Re: Ask HN: Should you reply STOP to unwanted texts?

#121

Post by adastra22 »

addicted wrote: post #119
adastra22 wrote: post #94

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> There has been a big effort in the last year+ to clean up the space and require consent before any SMS is sent. Unless it is political

Unfortunately political messages have an exception in the laws involved here. Also, my understanding is that this isn’t even a case of the politicians making an exception for themselves but for this being protected speech, so there are legal issues with blocking it without the kind of majorities American congress is not capable of anymore.

I don't see how there could be an argument for protected speech here. The constitution protects your ability to petition the government, not the government's ability to petition you.

Re: Ask HN: Should you reply STOP to unwanted texts?

#122

Post by tzs »

mikesabat wrote: post #17
solardev wrote: post #3

It kinda depends on which platform handles their bulk messages. For example, if they are messaging you through Twilio, replying with "STOP" will cause Twilio itself to opt you out of messages ( https://help.twilio.com/articles/223134027-Twilio-support-fo... ), and the sender can't disable that ( https://help.twilio.com/articles/360034798533-Getting-Starte... ). It's kinda like how Mailchimp handles unsubscriptions fo…

Speaking mostly for the US here. The STOP keyword is mandated as unsubscribe at the carrier level (Verizon, ATT, TMo) not just the vendor level. So if you reply STOP, it's very likely that you will not receive another message from that number. This will be true for any programmatic SMS vendor. There could be smaller scale & more manual approaches, but that would be rare. There has been a big effort in the last year+…

> The STOP keyword is mandated as unsubscribe at the carrier level (Verizon, ATT, TMo) not just the vendor level. So if you reply STOP, it's very likely that you will not receive another message from that number.

Is that just for programmatic messages, or all messages?

I could see problems if it was all messages. For instance suppose a relative coming to visit for weekend and due to arrive around 5 pm Friday. You get a text from them that afternoon saying that there was an accident that has blocked traffic and police say it will be several hours before the road reopens.

They ask if you would prefer that they continue as soon as the road reopens, which will probably mean they will arrive around 1 am Saturday, or stop and spend the night with another relative who lives near where they are currently stuck, and then come Saturday morning which will get them to your place around 9 am.

You text back "stop" to indicate the latter option, and now texts from that relative are blocked. Oops.

Re: Ask HN: Should you reply STOP to unwanted texts?

#123

Post by JTyQZSnP3cQGa8B »

Havoc wrote: post #108
adastra22 wrote: post #97

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Except that STOP is handled at the carrier level and isn't even returned to the sender. It's effectively a mandated block command.

For which countries is this true?

Definitely not France. The STOP message is ignored. They also created a global “block” list that you can subscribe to. This list is handled by an advertising company…

Re: Ask HN: Should you reply STOP to unwanted texts?

#124

Post by crossroadsguy »

adastra22 wrote: post #97
jonathanstrange wrote: post #69

A Golden Rule of the internet says that you should never reply to unwanted texts on any medium: - stalkers and trolls live off reactions, both positive and negative ones - spammers will use your reply to verify there's a human at the other side - colleagues and friends will hate you because everybody thinks they're important Replying only has negative effects. Use client-side filtering, kill files, blocking functions…

Except that STOP is handled at the carrier level and isn't even returned to the sender. It's effectively a mandated block command.

And if I send a reply to my friend with just the text "stop" - that does it, right? I mean part of normal conversation, not to indicate that they should stop messaging me. Or should I remember that it's the special phrase?

Re: Ask HN: Should you reply STOP to unwanted texts?

#125

Post by senojsitruc »

I tried that recently with some political texts. I do not recommend. It could be coincidental, but I suddenly started receiving a lot more political texts.

It might be true that I stopped receiving texts FROM THAT NUMBER, it's clearly the same organization spamming me from other numbers. Whatever. I'd rather get spam texts than robocalls.

Re: Ask HN: Should you reply STOP to unwanted texts?

#126

Post by bityard »

crossroadsguy wrote: post #124
adastra22 wrote: post #97

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Except that STOP is handled at the carrier level and isn't even returned to the sender. It's effectively a mandated block command.

And if I send a reply to my friend with just the text "stop" - that does it, right? I mean part of normal conversation, not to indicate that they should stop messaging me. Or should I remember that it's the special phrase?

Carriers know the difference between bulk text senders and your friend

Re: Ask HN: Should you reply STOP to unwanted texts?

#127

Post by tzs »

godelski wrote: post #19
godelski wrote: post #14

First off, add yourself to the FCC's do not call list: https://www.donotcall.gov/ Once you've done that, they have 31 days to comply. There's plenty of legal entities that still will call you. If you answer, be polite, play the dope a bit to get the necessary unfortunately, ask how they got the number, then request a manager (yes, they have one, they will tell you they don't. Be polite but insist). When you get the m…

If you're an engineer for Google or Apple the best thing you could do is build into an easy way for users to report to the FCC. It's a routine forum, no ML needed but hey, pitch it if you need that to get this shit done. If you work somewhere that is spamming and enshitified, the way to convince your boss is to show them that their domains are being blocked and that leads to less money. That's the language they under…

Unfortunately if you make reporting too easy whoever processes the reports will have to deal with a whole lot of false positives. A lot of people seem to confuse spam and non-spam that they just happen to not be interested in at the moment.

For example if you sell things on the web people will come to your site, add items to your cart, go to your checkout page, enter their email, pay, and then when they receive an emailed receipt mark it spam.

Heck, I've seen people who ask for help by sending email to a support email address, and then mark the automatic reply from the ticketing system that lets them know their request has been received and tells them how long it will take before someone gets back to them as spam.

I've also seen people complain that a company wasn't responding to their emails to support, when in fact the company is responding but the person had marked earlier receipt emails or emails letting them no that their subscription that they had opted into auto-renew for was going to renew soon as spam.

Note: in all the examples above I'm talking about companies that do not send marketing emails except to people who go to a separate page that is explicitly for signing up for newsletters. The only emails sent to the person where receipts, re-bill notices, and responses to mails the person had sent.

Re: Ask HN: Should you reply STOP to unwanted texts?

#128

Post by chirau »

tzs wrote: post #122
mikesabat wrote: post #17

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Speaking mostly for the US here. The STOP keyword is mandated as unsubscribe at the carrier level (Verizon, ATT, TMo) not just the vendor level. So if you reply STOP, it's very likely that you will not receive another message from that number. This will be true for any programmatic SMS vendor. There could be smaller scale & more manual approaches, but that would be rare. There has been a big effort in the last year+…

> The STOP keyword is mandated as unsubscribe at the carrier level (Verizon, ATT, TMo) not just the vendor level. So if you reply STOP, it's very likely that you will not receive another message from that number. Is that just for programmatic messages, or all messages? I could see problems if it was all messages. For instance suppose a relative coming to visit for weekend and due to arrive around 5 pm Friday. You get…

It only applies to programmatic and automated messages

When a company or service sends text messages using an automated system like SMS marketing software or bulk messaging service), these platforms are by design and mandatorily programmed to recognize keywords like "STOP" as a signal to unsubscribe the recipient from future messages. This is a requirement for all such systems under Telephone Consumer Protection Act (TCPA).

Text messages to your friends do not go through such platforms and so are not subject to that law.

Re: Ask HN: Should you reply STOP to unwanted texts?

#129

Post by a2tech »

tzs wrote: post #122
mikesabat wrote: post #17

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Speaking mostly for the US here. The STOP keyword is mandated as unsubscribe at the carrier level (Verizon, ATT, TMo) not just the vendor level. So if you reply STOP, it's very likely that you will not receive another message from that number. This will be true for any programmatic SMS vendor. There could be smaller scale & more manual approaches, but that would be rare. There has been a big effort in the last year+…

> The STOP keyword is mandated as unsubscribe at the carrier level (Verizon, ATT, TMo) not just the vendor level. So if you reply STOP, it's very likely that you will not receive another message from that number. Is that just for programmatic messages, or all messages? I could see problems if it was all messages. For instance suppose a relative coming to visit for weekend and due to arrive around 5 pm Friday. You get…

It’s just programmatic vendors. The problem as someone else in the thread pointed out is that shadier carriers won’t honor it or only pay lip service to it. And people that are doing spam campaigns will be forging numbers and rotating numbers constantly so actually blocking the numbers does very little.

Re: Ask HN: Should you reply STOP to unwanted texts?

#130

Post by dkdbejwi383 »

senojsitruc wrote: post #125

I tried that recently with some political texts. I do not recommend. It could be coincidental, but I suddenly started receiving a lot more political texts. It might be true that I stopped receiving texts FROM THAT NUMBER, it's clearly the same organization spamming me from other numbers. Whatever. I'd rather get spam texts than robocalls.

are these unsolicited political messages? Where do you live that this is a thing? It's something I've not experienced before.
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