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Twilio’s toll fraud problem

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Re: Twilio’s toll fraud problem

#71

Post by ender341341 »

eitau_1 wrote: post #67
randyburden wrote: post #48

We've been hit by this at work as well. We had to add CAPTCHA and a several other techniques to defend against this. How it works: 1. Attacker leases 1 or more premium rate numbers in an international country. - Attacker can lease a premium rate number for as little as $10/month - Typically, the attacker gets to keep 70% of the money generated by the premium rate number. 2. Attacker then finds companies with OTP (One…

> premium rate number costs 10 cents wut, the absolutely most ordinary (in the realm of single telecom) text costs me ~6.5 cents

Can I ask where?

I'm in the US and any of the big carriers offer unlimited texting as a baseline, and we have pretty crappy carriers compared to a lot of the world.

Re: Twilio’s toll fraud problem

#72

Post by Teever »

bragr wrote: post #50
Terretta wrote: post #33

Your only power to encourage them to fix this is to do the thing they're begging you not to: dispute the charges . If a threshold of Twilio customers dispute charges, Twilio loses the ability to process credit cards at a lower risk rate, then with all but high risk processors, then may lose the ability to process them at all. If enough of their customers are getting burned, and enough dispute, Twilio would no longer…

>Your only power to encourage them to fix this is to do the thing they're begging you not to: dispute the charges. I'd check their TOS to see if they offer some kind of arbitration option. As noted in other threads, triggering that process can be a surprisingly effective way to make someone from the company actually engage with the issue. Disputing the charges is always a nuclear option. They may never do business wi…

> Disputing the charges is always a nuclear option. They may never do business with you after that.

This is something that I think needs to be regulated. I'm not saying that this should be the case for a company the size of Twilio, but I definitely think that a company the size of Apple/Google/Samsung should not be able to ruin your life because you had temerity to stand up to them and dispute a charge.

Re: Twilio’s toll fraud problem

#73

Post by STELLANOVA »

mxuribe wrote: post #20
tobinfekkes wrote: post #8

I loved Twilio many years ago, but they've become the new Google/SendGrid/Shopify/Stripe/Uber/(soon to add CloudFlare). They retain the right to any/all the upside of any risk/scale, and you retain the obligation in any downside. No questions. It's despicable.

Same here! So, i wonder then, who would be a viable alternative to Twilio?

There are some alternatives for example:

https://wavecell.com/sms/

While they are mostly known in Asia but they offer service in Europe/North America as well.

Re: Twilio’s toll fraud problem

#74

Post by tobinfekkes »

johndhi wrote: post #29
tobinfekkes wrote: post #8

I loved Twilio many years ago, but they've become the new Google/SendGrid/Shopify/Stripe/Uber/(soon to add CloudFlare). They retain the right to any/all the upside of any risk/scale, and you retain the obligation in any downside. No questions. It's despicable.

Confused, I don't see what's in common with all of the companies in your list. I work with Twilio a lot and kind of agree with your last sentence but what do you mean? Are these normal business practices?

Unfortunately, a cursory glance at the tech landscape betrays that these are "normal" business practices.

Or, more accurately, that they have become normal, rather than being objectively normal.

Re: Twilio’s toll fraud problem

#75

Post by tobinfekkes »

STELLANOVA wrote: post #73
mxuribe wrote: post #20

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Same here! So, i wonder then, who would be a viable alternative to Twilio?

There are some alternatives for example: https://wavecell.com/sms/ While they are mostly known in Asia but they offer service in Europe/North America as well.

Thank you for sharing. Haven't heard of this before.

Re: Twilio’s toll fraud problem

#78

Post by toomuchtodo »

bredren wrote: post #46
toomuchtodo wrote: post #44

Earlier quoted context omitted.

They could, but customers could then file complaints with the FTC and their state’s attorney general for the fraud Twilio is enabling. I strongly encourage Twilio customers to pursue this route if Twilio is charging them for fraudulent charges.

These filings may add up to change at some later time, though are unlikely to provide any kind of near-term actionable remedy.

Such is America’s regulatory landscape ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

Re: Twilio’s toll fraud problem

#80

Post by gghffguhvc »

acover wrote: post #51
Terretta wrote: post #33

Your only power to encourage them to fix this is to do the thing they're begging you not to: dispute the charges . If a threshold of Twilio customers dispute charges, Twilio loses the ability to process credit cards at a lower risk rate, then with all but high risk processors, then may lose the ability to process them at all. If enough of their customers are getting burned, and enough dispute, Twilio would no longer…

That Twillio doesn't protect you is bad. However, would a court agree you don't owe them the money? This recommendation seems like abuse of disputing a charge and will just get you banned from Twillio.

You don’t even have a viable option for court as they have forced arbitration clauses.
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