How to confuse a computer auto-dialer

As I'm sure everyone knows, most solicitation calls start with a computer auto-dialing your number. A real live pitchster only comes on the line after you answer, right? I've figured out one more thing about them. The computer won't connect the call to a live body on the other end UNLESS it hears you.

Most people answer the phone and right away they say "Hello" (or something similar) right? Well as it turns out it appears that most of the auto-dialer computers are actually triggered to switch the line over to one of their sales people (or professional beggars if it is a charitable solicitation) ONLY after it HEARS you say "Hello".

I have discovered that if you don't say anything then the call never gets switched over. You'll just hear silence for a few seconds and then it will disconnect the call.

I've been doing this for a little while now. Just pick up the phone and wait for the caller to speak first. If it is an auto-dialed call I just listen for a few seconds and let it disconnect. I can't prove it, but this approach seems to be reducing the number of calls I'm getting. It certainly seems like I am getting fewer of them since I started doing this a couple of months ago.

I believe that if the auto-dialer doesn't detect your presence and connect you to one of their solicitors that it will "flag" your number a being a bad/inactive/dead number and remove it from their list.

At least that's my theory, and so far it seems to be working quite well. I haven't actually had to tell a solicitor to bug off in several months and I seem to be getting a decreasing number of those annoying auto-dialed calls.

YMMV, but I suggest everyone give it a try. What have you got to lose?

I don't answer calls from unknown numbers.

Figure if its someone I know, they'll leave a message.

101Voodoo said:

I don't answer calls from unknown numbers.

Figure if its someone I know, they'll leave a message.

Click to expand...

Yeah, I tried that too. But I seemed to be getting more and more of the calls. The problem is that if you let it go to voicemail or an answering machine the darned computer "hears" something/someone on the line and switches the line to one of their solicitors.

Of course the human recognizes that it isn't a live body on your end and they hang up. BUT the computer thinks it succeeded in connecting someone at your number with one of their solicitors - and your number stays in their dialing list as a good/active number. So then as the list gets sold and re-sold you keep getting more and more of the calls.

We got a robo call the other night at a couple of minutes aftern midnight from something calling itself the Drug Free Florida Committee opposing medical pot in Florida. Apparently these calls were going out all night long from midnight until 7am but were supposed to go out noon to 7pm. Needless to say, there were a LOT of angry people in Florida. Maybe not as angry as I was getting the call in Atlanta and not being registered to vote in Florida in over five years.

I answer and then hang up immediately. The ringing stops and they go away.

I had a "security System" sales robo call everyday and sometimes 3 times a day. They came from area codes all over but always the same company. I ask a guy to stop calling and he said my number would be taken out of the call list. I started getting calls every 15 to 20 minutes and picked up the phone after about 2 hours and blasted the next salesman. He apologized and said he would take me off the call list. I yelled about all the other callers lists. He stopped, then said he had removed me from the data bank. I haven't had a call from them since.

Ivan

For those using VOIP (where your phone service is provided by your internet provider, like Comcast or AT&T), there is a free service called nomorobo (Google will take you to it). It's easy to set up and your phone will ring one and half times, then the call is routed to an online service that answers the call with a message that your number doesn't accept calls from the number calling you. I've been using it for almost a year and this election year, it's been a blessing.

In the case of the credit account robocalls, I rarely pass up the chance to talk to a person; it allows me to unburden the day's frustrations out on someone who deserves it.


I also get to practice swearing in Cantonese, as my friend is teaching me ALL the important phrases.

It seems that whatever calls me gives up after 6 rings, I don't worry because it calls on a landline I never use that is part of my bundle. Sometimes, just for grins, I answer and Say "Metro Vice, taped line"

"Hello. If you are calling from the Treasury department or the IRS, press 1. If you are calling from Microsoft to fix my computer, press 2. If you are calling from the bank about my credit card, press 3. If you are my long lost nephew calling for bail money, press 4. If you are my long lost nephew stuck in a foreign country and need hospital money, press 5. If you are calling about a contribution for a political candidate or organization, press 6. To hear this in Spanish, call someone in Spain. If you actually are a friend seeking conversation, please leave a message at the tone."

Interesting approach, and I'll definitely give it a try. The last month or so, I've been getting all types of garbage calls from live people and robo dialers. I dont know who sold my number, but they got my dad's name attached to it. I've blocked over 50 numbers.

Problem is I've had this number registered on the NO CALL LIST since 2006. I actually went and double checked.

Bigger problem is that to register a complaint against a number it takes a solid 15 minutes, per number!! Big government bureaucracy at its best

If I don't know the number it isn't answered, especially if it's a toll-free number. Nothing good ever comes via a toll-free number.

Leave a message, or take a flying leap.

venomballistics said:

nice try, but do understand that a relatively recent raid on a call center in India has likely impacted your numbers moreso than your tactics

if you built the machine ... would you not register every picked up call as a positive hit on an active number?
I sure would ....
once determined, its a matter of correct packaging. it goes on a list that will be sold to the next center and the next until one of them "cracks your biological code"

Click to expand...

I presume you are referring to my theory. Was the call center in India doing other forms of solicitation besides impersonating the IRS? I was of the understanding that the IRS scam call center is the only one that was busted and shut down. If that is correct then it has had no effect on the number of calls I'm receiving. I never received any calls from the IRS scammers OR the fake Microsoft tech support people or any of the other scammers. My calls have all been sales calls (timeshares, credit card offers and such) or charities - most of which are unknown organizations. This technique I have described is something I've been doing for 2-3 months - long before the Indian scam ring got busted.

And no, I would not program the dialer to automatically assume every answered call is a valid number. If you did, how would it distinguish between the call being answered by a person and the call being answered by the phone company's equipment - the computer that gives you the "disconnected" or "no longer in service" message for example? That would also qualify as the call being connected - just connected to the phone company's computer instead of a person.

The dialing machine obviously does NOT automatically "register" every call that is picked up as a connection to a good or valid number - if it did it would also automatically go ahead and connect the call to one of the live solicitors standing by to make the pitch. But that is not what is happening. If it doesn't "hear" a response within a set period of time it disconnects the call. If I let it go to my answering machine, when it "hears" my answering machine message it connects the call on through to one of the people waiting. I can hear it happening on the answering machine speaker.

Like I said, I can't prove that NOT hearing a response and disconnecting the call means my number is getting "flagged" as a bad or invalid number. But what I do know is that over the last 3 months or so that I've been doing this, the quantity of calls to my number has definitely decreased - from an average of a couple or more per day to just two or three per week. The only thing that I can see that has changed is that I stopped letting them go to the answering machine and started answering the phone - but giving them the "silent treatment".

Believe it or not - it seems to be working - and what would you have to lose by trying it?

101Voodoo said:

I don't answer calls from unknown numbers.

Figure if its someone I know, they'll leave a message.

Click to expand...

I do that on Toll free numbers.

I helped an elderly woman that was in a bad car accident this weekend hitting a deer. She was pretty hysterical and full of glass when i stopped. Asked me to call her daughter for her. So thats a time a strange phone number might show up. It was a cell phone number so she could not hear the message until after the person hangs up. Still wonder when she found out about her mom. Never called me back.

what would I have to lose ..... my sanity after coming to the realization that I might never conclude my restroom business ever again for the rest of my natural life.

venomballistics said:

what would I have to lose ..... my sanity after coming to the realization that I might never conclude my restroom business ever again for the rest of my natural life.

Click to expand...

Ummm, yeah. I don't answer the phone when I'm in the bathroom - and I'm not suggesting anyone else do so either.

At this point if you're letting the calls go to voicemail or to an answering machine you're already confirming the validity of your number for them - which ensures that it will stay on their active numbers list. So I ask again, what would you lose by trying the technique I've been using? Nevermind, your mind is made up and I've seen others waste time and effort trying to change it in other threads. So you just keep doing what you're doing.

For those reading this who are more open-minded, give it a try. Like I said, what have you got to lose? You may find - as I have - that the number of calls "inexplicably" starts to decrease.

BC38 said:

Ummm, yeah. I don't answer the phone when I'm in the bathroom - and I'm not suggesting anyone else do so either.

At this point if you're letting the calls go to voicemail or to an answering machine you're already confirming the validity of your number for them - which ensures that it will stay on their active numbers list. So I ask again, what would you lose by trying the technique I've been using? Nevermind, your mind is made up and I've seen others waste time and effort trying to change it in other threads. So you just keep doing what you're doing.

For those reading this who are more open-minded, give it a try. Like I said, what have you got to lose? You may find - as I have - that the number of calls "inexplicably" starts to decrease.

Click to expand...

well .. you put it out there and got some folks willing to try it.
lets have those willing to do so report back with their results

venomballistics said:

well .. you put it out there and got some folks willing to try it.
lets have those willing to do so report back with their results

Click to expand...

EXACTLY what I have been proposing - and what you seemed to be arguing against.

Glad we ended up on the same page!

BC38 said:

EXACTLY what I have been proposing - and what you seemed to be arguing against.

Glad we ended up on the same page!

Click to expand...

truth be told ... didn't actually read that part.
between the cubs winning the world series causing scanner feed chaos, sorting out speculation from the next Assange delivery, and other high speed events ... skim reading is necessary

When my oldest son was 2-3 years old and quite a talker, my wife used to pass the phone off to him when asked for the man of the house. Not quite sure how long the record was, but 20 minutes sticks in my mind.