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Apple needs to change iPhone’s call UI because robocalls are killing us

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Re: Apple needs to change iPhone’s call UI because robocalls are killing us

#151

Post by jondwillis »

nyjah wrote: post #28

Tapping Decline is not a great option because it actually tells the robocaller that you’re with your phone and are annoyed by the call, information I’d rather not give. Call me paranoid, but I take it a step further and absolutely believe whatever cold call company is calling knows when my phone is moving, or I am around it. I am the type of person that doesn't carry their phone all the time, I usually keep it in my…

I have noticed that when I decline spam calls, I receive more calls, sometimes right after, sometimes over the next few days. I probably receive 30+ spam calls in a week, if I decline all of them.

Re: Apple needs to change iPhone’s call UI because robocalls are killing us

#152

Post by VectorLock »

I don't know hardly anything about telephony protocols, SS7, etc but I'm curious how much information carriers know about where information originates.

Say I wanted to run a service offering phone numbers that can connect to VOIP or an app, where I connect to the global telephone network. How much information can I get at the lowest protocol level about where a call originates from? Can I tell the system the call came from? The country?

Re: Apple needs to change iPhone’s call UI because robocalls are killing us

#153

Post by JustSomeNobody »

mikestew wrote: post #9

AFAIK, it's still the case that I can't block everything but numbers in my contacts, right? That's all I'm asking, and it can't be that hard. Add that simple feature that should have been there ten years ago and the problem is solved for me.

Apple won't do this because they don't want to field a million support requests from angry users about missing calls when they turn this on and forget about it.

Re: Apple needs to change iPhone’s call UI because robocalls are killing us

#155

Post by basilgohar »

Waterluvian wrote: post #147

So what's the trick? I've had the same cell number for a decade and I get zero unwanted calls a year. Is it just luck or am I accidentally doing something that keeps my number from being spammed?

While I don't get zero, I get far fewer than most others commenting here (50+/day!). My wife, on the otherhand, gets more than I do.

I sometimes somewhat arrogantly think it's because I have been more careful about giving our my info to untrustworthy sources, not using Facebook, myriad "phone/contact-sucking" apps like Line, Imo, WhatsApp, etc. that others in my family do/have, but then again, I finally caved and started using WhatsApp while abroad due to it being literally as or more important than a traditional line – many services here have WhatsApp-only numbers. I think I've finally lost the battle.

Re: Apple needs to change iPhone’s call UI because robocalls are killing us

#156

Post by dgzl »

As an Android user, I'm kind of shocked that the iPhone doesn't do this, and I'll say that the banner UI is decently better. Though I'm not going to lie, I still think we can do better, and I wouldn't doubt that Apple would just opt for the next generation UI instead of following Android's suit.

Sometimes I wonder what subtle differences there are between the two ecosystems, as I've never really gotten into Apple products before, with the exception of a few earlier iPods. Does anyone have confirmed differences that the other side might not understand?

Re: Apple needs to change iPhone’s call UI because robocalls are killing us

#157

Post by diebeforei485 »

izacus wrote: post #38

I never get robocalls in Europe - what's different here? Why does USA have this huge problem with spam calls and most of Europe doesn't? Is spam blocking on OS level really the right approach to fix this problem?

> Why does USA have this huge problem with spam calls and most of Europe doesn't?

Presumably because (1) it's much easier to find English speakers in countries where most robocalls actually originate, and (2) the same model can scale to 320M recipients with very little marginal effort.

Re: Apple needs to change iPhone’s call UI because robocalls are killing us

#158

Post by tonydiv »

amluto wrote: post #108
ac29 wrote: post #82

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There already is a proposed technological solution to this: https://transnexus.com/whitepapers/stir-and-shaken-overview/ The FCC has recently "demanded" US telecoms to implement this [0], but at this point I don't believe there is actually a regulatory requirement to do so. [0] https://docs.fcc.gov/public/attachments/DOC-354933A1.pdf

I prefer an economic solution. Currently, you can sue a robocaller under the TCPA, but good luck collecting. Make each carrier liable for judgments against robocallers routed through their network. So, if I sue John Doe for robocalling me and I can’t collect, and I’m a Verizon customer, the make Verizon liable for those damages. This should come with some limits, but they should be large (say 10% of nationwide annual…

Love it

Re: Apple needs to change iPhone’s call UI because robocalls are killing us

#159

Post by Rjevski »

nikanj wrote: post #133
awakeasleep wrote: post #14

"At the telelphony-infrastructure level, it’s a supremely difficult problem that lacks a short-term fix because the underlying protocol is hopelessly insecure." This is only partly true. Technologically the solution is difficult, but it's easy from the social side as carriers can blacklist the smaller carriers that allow this fraud to take place. The real problem is that everyone except the consumer benefits from thi…

I’d be happy to have a SPF like framework for calls. The phone number blocks are allocated to companies, and it should be trivial to ensure the incoming call comes from the legitimate holder of the block. Add an authorized user api so you can still use your number in outgoing calls with Skype etc. After number faking is fixed, I can safely ignore all calls from foreign countries and weird area codes.

I thought about a similar system but based on cryptography.

The telecoms regulators for each country would act as a CA and have their root key capable of signing anything for that particular country code, and phones would have all of them in their trust store (it could be all managed by the GSMA or something).

They would in turn issue certificates to any telecoms company that has number ranges allocated - those certs allow signing of calls for any of the number ranges the cert is for, as well as signing further certs. The telecoms company will in turn issue certificates for their customers for their assigned number only. It could be placed on the SIM card or distributed by email (perfect security isn’t needed here - “good enough” is all that’s required).

When a phone places a call it signs it with its certificate and the current date & time (to avoid replay attacks), and any equipment in the call path can verify the chain of trust all the way back to a trusted CA before relaying the call.

As the user still holds the end certificate, legitimate caller ID spoofing is still possible by them, but not anyone else.

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