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FCC will require phone carriers to authenticate calls by June 2021 [pdf]

docs.fcc.gov

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Re: FCC will require phone carriers to authenticate calls by June 2021 [pdf]

#191

Post by kbuck »

cletus wrote: post #184

Good. But really, why did this take this long? It should be relatively easy to identify the bad actors here and I don't mean the spammers, I mean the telcos that make this possible, deliberately so, by essentially "laundering" spam calls. My response to picking up a number is to answer the call and say nothing. Auto-dial systems will route the call to a person when they get a "live" response. I don't know the criteri…

Regarding robocalls from political campaigns: I removed my phone number from my voter registration, because honestly I don't want any calls or texts from campaigns. I left my email address in case they want to spam that. I recommend doing the same (although at least with Gmail I find that several of the political emails end up in the spam folder...)

Re: FCC will require phone carriers to authenticate calls by June 2021 [pdf]

#192

Post by DaniloDias »

hammock wrote: post #53

What are the privacy implications of this requirement?

None. You are already in a weak non-repudiation environment with cell phones. This solution will reduce some spoofing, but I doubt it will eliminate it.

It will be interesting to see who will be running the CA for these connections.

Re: FCC will require phone carriers to authenticate calls by June 2021 [pdf]

#193

Post by phs2501 »

skrtskrt wrote: post #133
rob-olmos wrote: post #118

Earlier quoted context omitted.

How will it still be available and what underlying software work in Asterisk is being referred to? Based on the given situation, the museum won't own the caller's cell phone number that they're trying to legitimately spoof for their staff's cell phone.

You've reached the limit of my knowledge here regarding implementation details :) Asterisk is an open-source PBX system. I think the original call will come in with the correct STIR/SHAKEN-validated SIP headers and the PBX can forward them as is, see some discussion here: https://community.freepbx.org/t/stop-robocalls-act/60921/5 I previously worked at a telecom software company, and I know everyone with their shit t…

Good to know; I admit I haven't looked at the technical side of this. Mostly I was just providing my "legit" use case for wanting to spoof numbers since I think a lot of times most people don't realize they exist.

Re: FCC will require phone carriers to authenticate calls by June 2021 [pdf]

#194

Post by jakub_g »

omginternets wrote: post #152
reaperducer wrote: post #68

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Why is this problem unique to the USA? Every time this topic comes up on HN, someone asks that same question. Then there's a bunch of responses that are lots of suppositions. Then several people from small European countries chime in saying they've never had a spam call. Then a bunch of Europeans from large countries show up saying they get spam calls, too, and it's not just an American thing. "Why is this problem un…

Oh, I can actually weigh in here. In the past ten years, I've spent significant amounts of time in the US, France and the UK. In the UK, I get the occasional spam call ("I'm calling with regards to the recent accident that wasn't your fault..."). At its peak, I got about one such call per week. It's been months since I've had a spam call. In France, I got zero. In the 7 years I lived there, I got exactly zero. Every…

Living in France since 2012, I get zero French spam calls on my mobile. I'm getting some immediate-disconnect calls from Algerian numbers though (no idea what those are). I used to get silent calls on a landline though, back when I had one (even if I never gave the number to anyone). One fine day I just disconnected it as it was annoying.

I used to get occasional spam calls on my rarely-used old Polish number, but since beginning this year they somehow stopped (late effect of GDPR perhaps?)

Re: FCC will require phone carriers to authenticate calls by June 2021 [pdf]

#195

Post by throwanem »

cletus wrote: post #184

Good. But really, why did this take this long? It should be relatively easy to identify the bad actors here and I don't mean the spammers, I mean the telcos that make this possible, deliberately so, by essentially "laundering" spam calls. My response to picking up a number is to answer the call and say nothing. Auto-dial systems will route the call to a person when they get a "live" response. I don't know the criteri…

I mute the mic and mash the keypad until the other end disconnects, no matter how long that takes. I find I get far fewer such calls than I did when I started, and the occasional hopelessly snarled-up IVR system is a nice bonus.

Re: FCC will require phone carriers to authenticate calls by June 2021 [pdf]

#196

Post by prawn »

cletus wrote: post #184

Good. But really, why did this take this long? It should be relatively easy to identify the bad actors here and I don't mean the spammers, I mean the telcos that make this possible, deliberately so, by essentially "laundering" spam calls. My response to picking up a number is to answer the call and say nothing. Auto-dial systems will route the call to a person when they get a "live" response. I don't know the criteri…

I'd noticed that initial silence thing as well, but mostly because I answer and speak immediately. The spammers generally have a lag on their software and connect shortly after my greeting. Then while I'm waiting in silence, they've missed that sign of life and sit there doing nothing.

Re: FCC will require phone carriers to authenticate calls by June 2021 [pdf]

#197

Post by chefandy »

ilamont wrote: post #6

Kind of curious why it took so long. Spoofed calls for fraud, swatting, etc. have been around for at least ten years.

Way more than 10 years. I saw a pretty in-depth demonstration on using this sort of spoofing for social engineering at H2K2, the 2600 HOPE conference in way back in 2002.

Re: FCC will require phone carriers to authenticate calls by June 2021 [pdf]

#198

Post by toast0 »

Negitivefrags wrote: post #31

Why is this problem unique to the USA? I'm not saying I never get spam calls, but I certainly have to scroll back quite a bit in my phone call history to see the last one. Also, on the rare occasion I do get a spam call it's always from some random international country like South Sudan or Oman that I would never expect a phone call from. What makes this problem uniquely hard to solve for the USA as opposed to anywhe…

There's a bunch of reasons why the US is targetted by spam callers.

a) it's a large market with a large penetration of internationally chargable credit cards. Several countries in the EU have their own payment systems including a bunch on a push model --- it's hard to scam germans over the phone because it's going to be hard to get them to send you funds without a german bank account; and if you have a german bank account, that's going to get you caught. Everywhere can process US visa and mastercard though.

b) large community that can be addressed with a single language; yes, there's a lot of people who would prefer another language, but they can probably be scammed in English (Although, with a bay area number I do get a good amount of scam calls in Chinese).

c) last, but probably most important; outbound calls to the US are incredibly cheap, as long as the number is not in Alaska. It's easy to find retail voip offers for less than 1 cent per minute to US numbers; and it doesn't matter if it's a landline or a cell phone. Calls to most EU mobile phones are at least 10 cents, but many countries are closer to 30 cents. That adds up quickly.

Re: FCC will require phone carriers to authenticate calls by June 2021 [pdf]

#199

Post by pkaye »

StavrosK wrote: post #174
pkaye wrote: post #168

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Do the spammers speak greek or english?

Greek, why would they speak English? They're usually phone companies offering discounts.

In the US we get a fair amount of spam calls originating from India. So an english speaking country would be their target.

Re: FCC will require phone carriers to authenticate calls by June 2021 [pdf]

#200

Post by StavrosK »

pkaye wrote: post #199
StavrosK wrote: post #174

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Greek, why would they speak English? They're usually phone companies offering discounts.

In the US we get a fair amount of spam calls originating from India. So an english speaking country would be their target.

Hmm, I see. What are they selling?
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