Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

France to ban unsolicited telemarketing calls

lemonde.fr

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

101–110 of 520 posts

Re: France to ban unsolicited telemarketing calls

#101

Post by thrance »

ascari wrote: post #63
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.

Exactly, I think all these regulations in the Europe fail to understand the enforceability of these, any legitimate business won't be making unsolicited calls already. For instance, I weekly get unsolicited calls from a legit recruitment agency in the UK, never ever shared my data with them, they don't even email but directly call in absurd times. I requested removal of my data after months of ignored calls but they…

This law is especially targeted at legit businesses... It's already illegal for scammers to call.

And I don't think something being hard to enforce is reason enough to not do anything about it. If we truly care about something, we can always find a way.

Re: France to ban unsolicited telemarketing calls

#103

Post by kuboble »

wolvoleo wrote: post #82
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…

Yes though most of the calls I get are scams. And most of them come from abroad now because Spain also banned them. It is not a very effective measure

At least a strategy to ignore unknown international numbers has much less collateral damage if any.

All emergencies from unknown numbers that I can thank of will be from local numbers.

I personally answer all phone calls but I have very little of those spam calls (on average once a month perhaps?) And I have learned to just rudely stop the call without saying "sorry, I'm not interested".

Re: France to ban unsolicited telemarketing calls

#104

Post by Sayrus »

eru wrote: post #91
ValentinPearce wrote: post #72

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I assume ownership of the caller's number can be logged/checked. I haven't had too much trouble with telemarketers lately but there is a crowdsourced app in France called Saracroche that can be easily installed on your phone and blocks spam numbers by becoming the caller id service. You can also use the app to report a number and help build the huge database.

> I assume ownership of the caller's number can be logged/checked. Alas, last time I checked numbers were something that was announced in-band, so it could be trivially faked by the caller. But I'm not sure if that's still true.

Not in the domain at all but wasn't this the purpose of STIR/SHAKEN but the biggest blocker was that large telcos hadn't deployed it? I think Android and iOS dialer app show you whether there was Caller ID Verification done or not so you may be able to drop anything unverified.

Re: France to ban unsolicited telemarketing calls

#106

Post by collabs »

My pet peeve is that a full class A attestation is still not a requirement in 2026. The US FCC won't do it. I have no hope from the current administration. However, perhaps France is in a unique position to implement this. The idea is that all calls that have a domestic caller ID will be required to have full class A attestation and all carriers will be required by law to block any calls that do not have such full attestation. Any carrier that attests phone numbers that it is not supposed to should get huge fines and criminal charges. This is my dream for what all Telecoms in the world should do, hopefully beginning with France. This requires broad support within the country and a firm deadline so companies don't shrug it off until the last moment and then demand an extension.

Re: France to ban unsolicited telemarketing calls

#107

Post by simiones »

msh wrote: post #86
Gigachad wrote: post #39

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I wonder how much we even need international calls from unknown numbers. In my life I have literally never legitimately had a call from an unknown number outside of the country. I guess it could be different if you have many connections or business deals internationally. But I feel like the average person could restrict inbound international calls to contacts only and be better off for it.

I dont think unknown numbers should be allowed at all, esp for business. I think its a reasonable requirement that if a business wants to call someone they are willing to identify them self.

I think they meant "unknown numbers" as "numbers that are not saved in my phone", not hidden numbers.

Re: France to ban unsolicited telemarketing calls

#110

Post by Telaneo »

riffraff wrote: post #6
amelius wrote: post #2

And what about those marketing people who approach you on the streets? Can we make that illegal too? And the people going from door to door?

How many door to door salesman do you encounter? Where do you live, if you can share? I haven't seen one in decades, and even then it was usually some pamphlets or books to support a cause or the other. On the phone (Italy), OTOH, I used to get daily scam call to buy "Amazon stocks" or change utility providers or install water filters. That seems to have massively faded out due to new regulations tho.

Probably a bit more than one per year. Mostly painters telling me I need to repaint.

Norway.

Post reply on HN