
Nuisance call firm Keurboom hit with record fine - happy-go-lucky
http://www.bbc.com/news/technology-39877362
======
_jal
I would love to see the FCC begin to pay attention to this garbage in the US.
I get about 4x more spam calls than from humans I actually want to hear from
on my cell. I no longer pick up any call I don't recognize, which has caused
problems. I also am in on-call rotation for my day job, so I can't just turn
the ringer off at night when "on".

And these assholes call constantly. I'm not at all a violent person, but
meeting someone with a financial stake in one of these operations would
seriously test me. I find them utterly enraging.

~~~
reza_n
Same, pretty much all phone calls I get these days are spam. And yes, very
frustrating to constantly get calls offering small business loans for my non
existent company.

Can anything be done to combat this?

~~~
pythonistic
I'm using Google Fi as my voice provider. It's not an awesome solution and
requires a very specific phone, but I do get three things that really help
with the spam calls:

* I can manage a list of spam and blocked callers online in addition to on the phone. This lets me move blocked call management off the phone and onto the carrier.

* I never have to answer my phone or listen to my voicemail: the transcripts have gotten to be very good, and appear relatively quickly after a call is received.

* Calls are flagged when I receive them, and probable spam calls are marked as such when the phone rings.

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bogle
2-bit operation folds, fine unpaid. Director and his missus (1 share each)
walk away unscathed.

~~~
DanBC
Directors are personally liable for ICO fines as a result of PECR
infringement.

At least, that was the plan, I'm not sure if this was enacted:
[http://www.wablegal.com/uk-directors-personally-liable-
nuisa...](http://www.wablegal.com/uk-directors-personally-liable-nuisance-
calls/)

~~~
bogle
Nope, not enacted and now kicked into the long grass.

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TuringNYC
You think this is bad, this is nothing. The worst thing is when one of these
call-bots hijacks your phone number as the source/caller ID. Then you get all
random people calling you about a missed call. We had a high-value xyz-8888
business number several years back that had this happen. We had to abandon the
number. I assume it was someone entering in a random source number that just
happened to be ours.

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martinald
ICO is a joke. £400k fine for 100million calls? That's probably way under what
they paid to make the calls in the first place, so can just be considered a
cost of business.

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heliodor
Until our government or phone companies fix this problem in the US, I don't
see another way to make a difference other than answering the phone, getting
put through to a human being, and wasting their time.

Have fun with it, don't give out any personal information, and slowly take
your story into ridiculous territory until the person on the other end catches
on that you are playing them and hangs up on you.

~~~
jonathankoren
The FTC Do Not Call List exists ( donotcall.gov ), and threatens fines against
violators. Problems with it (beyond the janky lowest bid government website),
is that you have to report the violators phone number, and anymore these are
spoofed.

Also, it feels like the FTC doesn't do anything. You never hear about
enforcement actions.

For a while after the DNCL came out, calls stopped, but they've been ticking
up recently. I keep getting calls selling me solar panels. When I asked how
they got the number, they said, "we're calling every homeowner in California."
Well, that's a violation.

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noonespecial
£400k? That's not a fine.

When the fine is that much less than the profits, its not a "fine". Its just a
tax. And a light one at that.

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sulam
Here's the most important part of the story:

"In October, the government announced plans to let the ICO fine company
directors as well as their businesses. "Making directors responsible will stop
them avoiding fines by putting their company into liquidation," the ICO said."

Awesome!

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godmodus
Need to stop fining companies and start suing the individuals. And actually
make it hurt. 500k is change. Could even be a "indirect" donation.

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twhb
Would somebody please explain the reasoning behind fining companies, not
individuals, to change the behavior of individuals? Because it seems to me
that if the net result of doing X is a bunch of money and no jail time, the
smart move is to continue doing X.

