France to ban unsolicited telemarketing calls

Post by [deleted] » Tue, Aug 11, 2026, 10:40 AM UTC

LeBit wrote: post #19

Kon5ole wrote: post #11

Great idea! Telemarketers have ruined the phone network for me. I haven't answered an unknown call for the past 10 years, which sometimes means I miss important ones. 99.9% of all calls are an attempt to get money, and the 0.1% that's a dentist appointment, a friend that changed numbers or whatever become collateral damage. A ban is the right idea but I wonder how they can handle it, logistically. I think there needs…

The whitelist managed by the government is not a bad idea. I’ve been thinking how to turn the table so that you could allow only certain parties to reach you if you allowed them to (say you are waiting for a call from the auto repair shop). I like the idea of a whitelist. But there needs to be a way for you to also manage that white list so that you can allow that repair shop to call you in the next few weeks.

Post by branko_d » Tue, Aug 11, 2026, 10:43 AM UTC

Kon5ole wrote: post #11

Great idea! Telemarketers have ruined the phone network for me. I haven't answered an unknown call for the past 10 years, which sometimes means I miss important ones. 99.9% of all calls are an attempt to get money, and the 0.1% that's a dentist appointment, a friend that changed numbers or whatever become collateral damage. A ban is the right idea but I wonder how they can handle it, logistically. I think there needs…

Post by pipe2devnull » Tue, Aug 11, 2026, 10:45 AM UTC

branko_d wrote: post #123

Kon5ole wrote: post #11

Great idea! Telemarketers have ruined the phone network for me. I haven't answered an unknown call for the past 10 years, which sometimes means I miss important ones. 99.9% of all calls are an attempt to get money, and the 0.1% that's a dentist appointment, a friend that changed numbers or whatever become collateral damage. A ban is the right idea but I wonder how they can handle it, logistically. I think there needs…

I feel this could be solved by crowdsourcing, assuming the support from the major phone manufacturers and possibly governments. - After a call from an unknown number concludes, the phone could offer an option to the user to mark it as "spam" (blocking the number in the history would have the same effect). - The spam mark would then go into the central database. If a phone number was marked as "spam" too many times, i…

Post by aitchnyu » Tue, Aug 11, 2026, 10:46 AM UTC

vjk800 wrote: post #46

Kon5ole wrote: post #11

Great idea! Telemarketers have ruined the phone network for me. I haven't answered an unknown call for the past 10 years, which sometimes means I miss important ones. 99.9% of all calls are an attempt to get money, and the 0.1% that's a dentist appointment, a friend that changed numbers or whatever become collateral damage. A ban is the right idea but I wonder how they can handle it, logistically. I think there needs…

There doesn't need to be any kind of technical solution. If a telemarketer wants to sell something, they must declare the name of their company. The company name can be reported to police (or whatever authorities are going to handle this) who can then fine the telemarketers.

Post by drcongo » Tue, Aug 11, 2026, 10:46 AM UTC

flyingshelf wrote: post #56

Essentially useless. My country also banned them and has a "do not call" registry, doesn't stop scammers from calling my phone non-stop. Also legally speaking all you need is "Check this box if you don't want spam" and the floodgates are open, legally. You need telco-level detection and blocking. If a cellphone number makes 1000 calls today maybe it's not a real cellphone, is it. Block the calls.