Robo text from 1(240)239-2914

That's very true....and if following the steps on a c-2013 dot.gov web page makes you feel better, then I invite you to do so.
If you manage to nail one of the very rare and incredibly stupid criminals who are spending their time and money here in the US to bother people with SPAM.....so much the better!

The thing that you do not understand is that it does not matter where the victim is located, but rather where the criminal is located.
It's ILLEGAL for someone in the US to send somebody in the US an unsolicited SMS....but what about Romania? China?
Is it illegal in those nations to send this unwanted text?
I would say that it's not illegal to THEM.

You can rail against the injustices of having to delete unwanted texts, but it's not going to matter very much in the real world.
Mobile phone spam - Wikipedia


Fun Fact:
SMS SPAM is considered to be a Trespass to chattels beef....which is something of a leap, legally....but hey.....in the USA it's a 1991 solution to a 2018 problem......

 

My wife is my collision avoidance system and my cell phone is usually off.

 

Some of those "other" top rated call block apps will expose your number and they do tell you that upfront. That's another reason I went with the one I did.

 

You mean this company linked in the original post?

From About Anti-Collision Radar System | Safe Drive Systems

Since they are a US company, US laws apply anyway no matter where the contractor is located.

 

This company maybe in the US, but I was just generalizing the point that many of spam calls, SMS, or e-mails are of untraceable foreign origin. Moreover, even if the law is on our side, a law without enforcement is useless, IMHO.

 

ETC(SS)'s point here is that many of them are carefully standing outside the reach of U.S. law enforcement. And hiding in the shadows too, to protect whatever U.S. assets and connections they may have.

It IS still very much illegal for them to reach into the U.S. with this activity. The real problem for us is (1) identifying them through all their masking and track-covering, and (2) finding a jurisdictional path to get our legal paws on them. As you said earlier, Wild West.

 

Non-commercial use is not illegal here in the U.S. Only unsolicited commercial use is (theoretically) banned.

My smart phone issue is relatively new, and I need to look into this. The land line issue is still much worse, and has been going on for years. The spouse's phone is an old style dumb phone, but is rarely turned on to receive anything.

All our phones are on our geographic area code, but even our landline number was transported from a different neighborhood to which we are no longer connected. The result is, we don't know anyone else sharing our exchanges on ANY of our phones, landline as well as two cells. Therefore, the simple now-common act of spoofing a caller-ID on our 'local' exchange, is an instant marker of fraud.

 

I have a solution that has worked well for us and my 95 year old Dad. Back when they were $25, I bought a phone Sentry. It's the version 2.2, not the expensive 3.1 that's out now. I use it in the simplest mode possible. I don't use the announce feature or press 0 feature. As new calls come in, I either whitelist them or black list them. It stores up to 9,999 numbers and even with several years usage and a presidential election, I've still only blocked about 600 numbers.

You must have caller ID and you will get one ring only on blocked calls. It takes one ring to get the Caller ID info.

It's been the best money I ever spent. Not a perfect solution, but it's about 99% perfect for me. No, I can't get rid of our landline yet as much as I want to.

 

^ I'd need to use the announce and press 0 feature. But this does look better than the products I quit looking at long ago because their black list capacity was much too low, and couldn't handle the modern random number spoofing.

 

Bob, don't you have Scam Block turned on?

Call Protection | Automatic Scam Protection for Your Phone | T-Mobile

Posted via the PriusChat mobile app.

 

Recently had a call, the phone screen showed it coming from Cailifornia, the caller claimed to be with the NH state police and he was requesting a donation, after hanging up the phone records listed the number belonging to a local 87 year old woman living in a local nursing home.

That’s some kind of hookie software mesh up

 

She's most likely given up her number and the lists just showed the last owner.

So very many people have dumped land lines for cell only that a ton of previously legit numbers are no longer in use. Those with land lines will occasionally get calls that are silent, no one there. These are computers calling all numbers to see which are in use and which are not, and then that list is sold.

I also have a device (Telezapper) that will transmit the SIT tone (3 tones before the number not in use message) anytime my phone is answered. It's effective against robo call machines.

 

Maybe, maybe not. Some spoofers just put up random numbers, often local to you, regardless of whether or not the numbers are still in use.

 

True, I've gotten calls from "me." Strange to see when it happens.

 

With VoIP phone services, even the land lines are no longer tied to the area code we actually live. After terminating our service on copper line a few years ago, we completely switched to VoIP. Now none of my phone numbers I own including landline and mobile have my local area code. I block ALL of anonymous calls to our phones, but caller IDs are no longer useful for distinguishing legit calls from spoofs.

 

I take those as targeted spoofs, not random ones. Just like junk emails from "me", though less common.

Just wait until there is enough 'big data' available to the crooks that they can start spoofing your friends and family. They are already sort-of doing it with email, from address lists stolen from web-based email systems.

 

Once while driving with my wife, both of our phones rang.
Mine said she was calling and hers said I was calling. Of course there was no completed call. There must have been a roaming glitch,

 

Truly a pull over, what the heck head scratch moment.

 

This was with Sprint and a coworker told me that CDMA handoffs sometimes go weird.
It was strange looking over at my wife's phone and seeing my number as calling her when my phone was firmly in my belt pouch.