Phone Spam

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Despite the best efforts of the Federal Goverment and the Do Not Call List, the proliferation of VOIP and cheap telephony has led to the recent surge in phone spam.Â Unsolicited calls spoofing caller ID, and using auto-dialers with pre-recorded messages trying to sell you extended auto warranties, debt relief, home security systems and other things you probably don’t want or need.

Several months ago, we received a new phone number, and almost immediately began getting incessant calls of this nature, sometimes as many as 6-10 per day.Â Asking to be removed from the list was ineffective. Hanging up was ineffective. Profanity was ineffective.Â We had essentially run into a situation where the cost per phone call was so negligible that the callers had no incentive to optimize for response.

We thought about it for a bit, and decided the one cost we could influence was the amount of time a human spent talking to us.Â This had a real cost for the caller, and we suspected that if our phone number were noted as particularly unprofitable, we would see a decline in the frequency of phone calls.Â We created a new game, to see how long we could keep a human being on the phone with us.

It worked. After a couple of 30 minute conversations, the frequency of these calls decreased to 1-2 per month. Along the way, we had many laughs at the expense of the hapless salespeople.Â A particular favorite was the person, responding to our assumed Slavic name, who asked whether our first or last name was easier to pronounce. We expressed to them our outrage at their insulting our proud Slavic heritage, and got a delightful backpedal.

On another, more recent occasion, we adopted a clingy, worried persona that was freaking out about the safety of his Toyota.Â Finally, when the first agent tried to transfer us, we informed him that we didn’t do well with change, were just getting comfortable with him, and begged him to stay with us. He didn’t.

The most surreal conversation, however, was with a young woman trying to offer us a “free” home security system last week.Â She told us that she needed to us to verify that we were speaking to a human being and not a recording. We were confused that she was unsure of whether she was human or not and told her so. We expressed sadness at her existential dilemma.Â She hung up on us.Â We hope that somewhere, out there, on this big blue ball, that she has found the answers to her deepest questions and has come to terms with her mortal existence.

We urge all of you to adopt our approach and eliminate this scourge. What was your funniest conversation with an evil phone spammer?