Film-Tech Forum ARCHIVE: Telezapper

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Posted by Brad Miller (Member # 2) on 12-18-2002, 04:38 PM:

Anyone have one of these? How effective is it?

And of course, what is the general consensus of how long these will remain effective before telemarketers change their computer dialer programming?

Posted by Dick Prather (Member # 1136) on 12-18-2002, 04:43 PM:

Brad,
My uncle tried this a couple of monthes ago and took it back a week later. He wasn't sure if it blocked any unwanted calls. I believe it only blocks one kind of system. All others get through.

Posted by Joe Redifer (Member # 3) on 12-18-2002, 05:16 PM:

What is a Telezapper? I get zero (yes ZERO as in NONE) telemarketing calls. My line simply does not accept unsolicited calls. If you call from somewhere like a switchboard, you must punch in your phone number before it will go through. And then that phone number shows up on the Caller ID. If you are calling from a rotary dial phone then you are screwed. Probably don't want to hear from you anyway if you are that far behind in the times. [Smile]

How people lived before Caller ID is beyond me.

Posted by Ken Layton (Member # 133) on 12-18-2002, 05:43 PM:

This was another product reviewed on KOMO-TV4 in seattle on the "Buyer Beware" segment of the 5 o'clock news. Connie Thompson (host of the segment) took several of these units to various volunteers' homes and then went to several telemarketing companies to see what happened with the equipment at the telemarketers' end of things. Some of the calls went thru to the homes just like normal. Some of the calls caused the telemarketer's equipment to flag the call as either "uncompleted" or "trouble on the line" or "line busy". In any event, the Buyer Beware reporter found that 90% of the telemarketers' calls still went thru as normal and the Telezapper was just plain junk.

Posted by Jack Ondracek (Member # 1466) on 12-18-2002, 06:13 PM:

That's interesting.
A local service tech has one of them & feels it kills about 80% of the calls he used to get.

The thought is that most computer dialers disconnect immediately after receiving the first of the 3 SIT tones you hear on an intercept recording. Considering the sheer volume of numbers these random dialers have to go through, the thought is that the accumulated time it would take to listen to all 3 tones would (overall) be pointless... the number would be as useless after the first tone as all 3. Therefore, the wisdom of the "telezapper" is that a computer dialer will drop off immediately and flag your number as "disconnected" or "restricted".

Brad's question about the telemarketers getting wise to these things (assuming they have that much penetration in the market as it is) is valid. Also, if you're being called by someone who is manually dialing their numbers, the 'Zapper would be useless.

One thing I wondered about was whether these things could be used to get rid of the junk "investment hotline" faxes we get every week. It's dubious if calling their delete number actually works, since it seems it takes a couple of months before your number drops off. The Telezapper "might" get rid of some of these... but I wonder if it might also interfere with the screening notices the film companies bulk-fax to us.

Posted by Steve Kraus (Member # 476) on 12-18-2002, 07:18 PM:

If your business is receiving unsolicited fax advertisements, the sender is violating the federal Telephone Consumer Protection Act of 1991 (47 U.S.C. § 227). This Act expressly prohibits sending unsolicited advertising by fax. Penalties for violations of the federal Act include an injunction to stop the practice as well as statutory and actual damages from $500 up to $1,500 per violation.

The Telephone Consumer Protection Act provides that the law may be enforced in state court, including Small Claims Court. The Act also provides that the recipient of an unsolicited fax advertisement may recover for each violation the greater of $500 statutory damages or the actual monetary loss suffered. In addition, federal law provides that if the violation was knowing or willful, the court may triple the damage award.

-- from the North Dakota Attorney General's web site.

Posted by Scott Norwood (Member # 30) on 12-18-2002, 07:24 PM:

Joe--I haven't gotten an unsolicited telemarketing call for months. I'm listed in the phone book and don't have caller ID or anonymous call rejection.

The only two things I've done are as follows: I have added my number to the Direct Marketing Association's "telephone preference service" (just like the junk mail list; you send them a letter telling them that you don't want unsolicted phone calls). Also, I have added my name to the state's list of people who don't want to recieive calls from automated dialing devices (this makes it illegal for anyone to use an automated dialing device to call me from within Massachusetts, though, curiously, political groups are exempted and I received a number of these calls during the November elections).

Maybe I've just been lucky, but I really haven't seen this problem, personally.

Don't get me started on email spam, though; filters like Spamassassin at http://www.spamassassin.org/ help somewhat, but don't solve the real problem of others who force me to subsidize their advertising.

Jack -- junk faxes are illegal; you might want to spend a few minutes to try to track down the slimeball who is sending them and get the state attorney general or someone else to prosecute him.

Posted by Nate Lehrke (Member # 1460) on 12-18-2002, 07:27 PM:

Before I bought one I got about 4 calls per week. After I had it, I still got about 4 calls per week. It didn't help me at all. I gave it away to the goodwill.

Caller-ID is the best, i think.

Posted by Barry Martin (Member # 1376) on 12-18-2002, 07:56 PM:

My wife's uncle was saying he loves it. When I saw it I was led to believe it put out a signal saying the line was disconnected or the person died or something along those lines. When he described using it he said he just checks the caller id for "out of area" or "private call" and doesn't answer it, the zapper takes care of it after that, and he hasn't had a "private call" or "out of area" for months. I would try it, but the companies that call about my bills and even my store show up as "private" or "out of area" so I would be ignoring legitimate calls as well. I wish it did work, I keep getting calls from companies looking for the Marriott because they have a similar number to mine. [Frown]

Posted by Christopher Seo (Member # 7) on 12-18-2002, 08:43 PM:

A friend who has it seems to think it's been pretty effective. The major logical problem is that every telemarketing company is still going to call you once before they "find out" you're a disconnected number.

And there's some new federal legislation in the works to create a national do-not-call list with fines up to $11k for telemarketers, who will also I think be required to display their phone number on Caller IDs. Hopefully to be implemented by next year. (Charities and, curiously again, political campaigns are to be exempted.)

Posted by Jon Miller (Member # 163) on 12-18-2002, 09:17 PM:

The Private Citizen Web site has a brief, but informative, page on the effect of the TeleZapper and "real" Special Information Tones on predictive dialer equipment.

Of course, if you own an answering machine, you don't have to buy a TeleZapper...just
download the SIT .WAV file and place the tones at the beginning of the outgoing message. This works best with answering machines that release the line when any phone in the house is picked up. I can say it works great...I enjoyed a period of very few telehawker calls (but freaked out a few legitimate callers in the process) while my message had the tones; lose the tones, though, and a new strain of telescum will soon grow [Frown]

(it happened to me, the message got corrupted).

Useless fact...the Telezapper is marketed by the same folks who make Dirt Devil vacuum cleaners. I'll let someone else have the honors of cracking puns with this one...

Posted by Jack Ondracek (Member # 1466) on 12-18-2002, 10:34 PM:

quote:
from Steve:
If your business is receiving unsolicited fax advertisements, the sender is violating the federal Telephone Consumer Protection Act of 1991...Penalties...include an injunction... as well as...damages from $500 up to $1,500 per violation.

That's true, Steve. Also, unless the law was removed from the books (how often does THAT happen?), an answered call where the caller either hangs up, remains silently on the line or otherwise fails to identify him/herself can be viewed as a harrassment call, subject to all the tricks and chicanery the phone company can use to track it... at least it used to be.

However, the problems are several. Upon your request, many "do not call" laws restrict a telemarketer from calling you again for a year ON THE LINE YOU WERE CALLED ON. Telemarketers can use hundreds of lines, even tap the internet to originate calls from locations remote from their operation base. Most of these lines are outgoing T1, ISDN or tie-line channels which commonly do not identify an originating number... because they have none. If your phone accepts calls from unidentified, restricted or "out of area" numbers, these calls will get through to you and will be practically untraceable. Unless someone really goes after you (not likely), no pattern will emerge from which a phone company can trace an offender... and they won't go after anyone without 3 or more traced calls. Your star-69 feature will not report the originating number, so there's not much you can give a law enforcement agency or a phone company to work with... even with these kinds of laws & penalties available.

Personally, I think the states are so focused on the ever-increasing spam problem that they don't pay too much attention to phone soliciting right now. As far as faxes are concerned... good luck! Those predictive dialers go after a telephone prefix with a vengeance. A human answers, they hang up immediately. A fax tone answers, they've got you.

I got a fax last week that promoted some penny stock. The source of the fax wasn't identified anywhere, nor was any originating brokerage or advertising company. Their toll-free "do not bug me" number was unidentified, other than to say "thank you for calling the do-not-call line", or the like... a service that inspired total confidence in me that my number was indeed removed from that particular dratted tele-faxa-marketing outfit! [Razz]

Posted by Joe Redifer (Member # 3) on 12-19-2002, 01:45 AM:

I strongly and passionately feel with all my heart that someone should upload a picture of a "Telezapper" so that I may look at it and appease my minimal curousity.

Scott- I forgot, I am ALSO on the states' "No call" list as well. That definitely does help, and it's free!

Posted by Brad Miller (Member # 2) on 12-19-2002, 05:18 AM:

Try this:
www.telezapper.com

Of course the Telezapper can't do anything about calls to your CELL PHONE! That is really annoying, as not only do I have to answer the phone from telemarketing scum, but I have to pay for the airtime! [Mad]

I have registered for the Texas No Call list to see how effective this will be. The price was certainly right! www.texasnocall.com Now if only the law will step in with the death penalty for anyone sending email spam. Oh what a wonderful life that would be.

Posted by Ian Price (Member # 14) on 12-19-2002, 01:46 PM:

I don't have a landline registered in my name. I do have a cell phone. My solicitation phone call count has gone way down. I don't get them at home, where I don't answer the phone, (it's not mine.) I don't get them on my cell phone. The calls that do get through to work are politely told that this is a business and they are not to call.

But; and there is always a but. Somebody sold my name to boiler room stockbrokers. So once per month I get a call about some hot stock at work. I am not polite with these people, I tell them to never call me and to get the hell off of my work phone.

Since my home address is at work, I receive very little junk mail as well.

I am about to buy a house that isn’t built yet. I am going to leave my home address at work for a while to see what kind of junk mail I get at a home that has never had an address before. I know I will get some because the mortgage brokers sell names and new home sales are public records. I will also hold off getting a phone as cell phone reception is good up there and I don’t have a home computer.

Posted by Jack Ondracek (Member # 1466) on 12-19-2002, 02:12 PM:

One that really irritates me is where my phone rings & when I answer, a recording says "I have a call for you... unfortunately, all of our representatives are busy right now. Please wait for the next... blah blah blah"...

Where did these people find their programmers? From doctors' offices? [Big Grin]

Rather than be somewhat less than polite to the unknown "representative", I just hang up on this system. I've always felt that if they want to talk to me that bad then I shouldn't have to wait for them to get around to me.

Posted by Steve Kraus (Member # 476) on 12-19-2002, 03:18 PM:

That's because the boiler room operations want to keep their people talking to someone constantly and given the number of no-answers and answering machines they have their computer dial many numbers in order to snag a single live human and then they connect them to a telemarketer. Sometimes there's not a free telemarketer so the hapless recipient of the call gets silence and a hangup click.

It was announced yesterday that there will be a national do not call list. Part of the new rules will require that calls such as I've described will have to have a recording telling the called party what happened.

Those who said they had Telezappers and found them useless, how long of a try did you give it? I would think it would take a while to get dropped from various lists. And you did have Caller ID, right? Isn't CID necessary for the device to work, spitting out the 3-tone dead number signal when it sees that CID is null or blocked?

Posted by Jack Ondracek (Member # 1466) on 12-19-2002, 04:36 PM:

quote:
Isn't CID necessary for the device to work, spitting out the 3-tone dead number signal when it sees that CID is null or blocked?

No... it plays the first SIT tone immediately when the called party picks up the phone (or an answering machine connects). Connection isn't immediate, so you only hear one tone about half the length of normal. It works by sensing the phone going on/off hook... so if you answer a "call waiting" call and then come back, the first caller will hear the tone again.

Some zapper models will allow you to play out the entire 3-tone series... but I'd think that might confuse callers.

We heard about that national "do not call" list on the news yesterday. They say the penalty for calling a number on that list could get as high as 11k$ [thumbsup]

Posted by Dave Williams (Member # 299) on 12-19-2002, 09:18 PM:

The "do not call" national list is a proposal to congress by the FTC. If passed all anyone needs do is put your name and number on it just once.

Telemarketers will be required to constantly update with the national list. Those operations that do not will be heavily fined, and hopefully put out of business.

With this in mind... it will take no time at all to put telemarketers out of business.

Makes me wonder what kind of lobby power they have with congressional memebers? Pay the right ones and it dies.

Remember children, power of the people, by the people, and for the people, is only a fairy tale.

Dave

Posted by Gerard S. Cohen (Member # 994) on 12-19-2002, 09:52 PM:

I used Scott's approach, the NY State Do Not Call list, on both my home and office lines. It took several months to notice the difference, but now we get only an occassional telemarketing call.

I haven't had success with unwanted faxes, though. They seldom contain the FCC legally required sender's fax number and name. Once I got one from a chiropractor whose telephone number was included, and I called him, stating the penalties, and he apologized abjectly and said he would immediately remove my number. But two more faxes arrived from him in the next two weeks.

Most annoying were faxes from someone in the U.K. running a "survey",
each time asking only one question "Are you for or against gun control [or abortion rights, smoking, etc.]" The sender was asked to call a 900 number (at $3.95 per minute) to answer Yes or No. It helpfully listed, in very fine print, the info that the average call cost $6.95, (but if they put you on hold, the sky could be the limit!)

With a phone I can just hang up. But with a fax, I don't know if it's possible to stop receiving a junk fax before it ends without screwing up the fax machine.

Posted by Steve Kraus (Member # 476) on 12-21-2002, 08:08 PM:

The telemarketers are raising First Amendment concerns but I see no problem with the new regs and I am a near absolutist when it comes to the First Amendment. This is not the government telling them not to call but private individual telephone users and the government is only requiring them to respect our wishes.

Posted by Scott Norwood (Member # 30) on 12-21-2002, 09:11 PM:

Interesting that they raise first-amendment issues, since commercial speech doesn't usually have the same level of protection afforded to political speech, and there are already far more severe restrictions on commercial speech than requiring that marketers respect a "do not call" list.

It really irks me when email spammers raise first-amendment issues, too. Their right to free speech doesn't extend to requiring me to subsidize their advertising (by supplying disk space, network bandwidth, etc.). [Mad]

I'm ordinarily a strong proponent of civil liberties and free speech, but some of these lobbyists are taking the idea a bit too far.