
AT&T CEO interrupted by a robocall during a live interview - howard941
https://www.theverge.com/2019/3/20/18274519/att-ceo-robocall-randall-stephenson-live-interview-fcc-ajit-pai
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orev
This honestly feels staged. I have never seen anyone in any interview receive
a call and pull out their phone to see who was calling. So in this ONE case,
someone was calling and he had to take out his phone? I imagine CEOs are
getting called constantly, even when they are in interviews. How come they
never pull out the phone for other calls? Do they just use airplane mode? If
so, then why wasn’t it enabled for this interview?

Just like most of what AT&T does, this is a lie. To what end I’m not sure. To
show everyone their incompetence in dealing with the problem? To try to put
pressure on the FCC to make some rules (that AT&T will fight against because
it hates regulation)? Or maybe they’re just trying to poke fun at the problem.

Edit: OK, so this was on CSPAN, not an actual TV interview. It does seem more
natural than something that is clearly staged, so now I have my doubts.

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idDriven
My guess is this is leading up to a PR campaign where the industry will make a
big deal about how seriously they are tackling the 'newly discovered' issue as
an attempt to undercut a push for actual governmental oversight and
regulation.

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r_smart
I mean, if they fix the problem, why would you be upset the government wasn't
involved? If the problem persists, we can always have the conversation again.
Barring anything else, government solutions tend to be inflexible (which is a
feature, but should be much more selectively used).

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nitrogen
Because the moment people aren't focused on the issue, it will return.

~~~
r_smart
I doubt it. It may mutate, but regulation has never stopped that sort of
thing. If anything, it gains legitimacy by finding a loophole (technical
compliance), and it's unlikely anyone will build the political capital to
amend the law. And even if they did, it will just mutate yet again.

~~~
idDriven
Look at net neutrality, the official corporate statement is of course they
support and free and open internet. However "According to lobbying disclosures
filed with the U.S. Senate and reviewed by Sludge, Comcast, Verizon, AT&T and
their largest trade groups, the Internet and Television Association (NCTA) and
CTIA, have spent $190.3 million on lobbying the FCC and other government
bodies, much of it to reverse net neutrality, since the 2015 rules were
passed."

Source: [https://readsludge.com/2018/06/11/today-net-neutrality-
offic...](https://readsludge.com/2018/06/11/today-net-neutrality-officially-
dies/)

~~~
r_smart
And the net result of that is what? Why would any business _want_ to have
regulations passed dictating what they can do? You can support a free, open
internet and still not want regulations dictating your behavior. They aren't
mutually exclusive.

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rhacker
I didn't do this but it has crossed my mind... The fastest way to end
robocalls forever:

Sign up every damn congressional seat's phone number to ever scammy health
insurance, hotel timeshare and PC help desk website's contact me form.

~~~
x0x0
I assume you're aware, but it's known that companies give white-glove
treatment to all congresspeople and their family and their friends.

From robocalls to health insurance to the credit reporting agencies to
comcast, these folks encounter none of the problems regular folks hit.

~~~
learc83
The majority of these robocalls companies are fly by night operations engaging
in illegal sales tactics. They aren't going out of their way to avoid members
of congress.

Even if they wanted to, it's not like there is a list of personal phone
numbers of important people to avoid calling.

>From robocalls to health insurance to the credit reporting agencies to
comcast, these folks encounter none of the problems regular folks hit.

Sure some companies go out of their way to cater to them, and most of them
(ab)use their position to make some problems go away. But most of the time
people don't even know who they are. There are 435 members of the House of
Representatives, and sizeable fraction changes every 2 years.

The majority of them aren't individually important enough to warrant that kind
of extreme deference from every company.

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tomc1985
Regarding caller ID spoofing part of these robocalls... I would think the
telco knows the number of each connected phone line, why can't they overwrite
whatever number the caller supplies?

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toast0
Historically, spoofing came from people with Primary Rate Interfaces (PRI, aka
calling over T1), where you got to set the outgoing caller id because you
might be running inbound calling separate from outbound calling, and you were
presumed to know what you're doing.

In the last 20 years, give or take, the spoofing comes from VoIP carriers that
are interconnected to the traditional telcos where you're receiving the calls.
Your carrier has no idea which customer of the other carrier is making the
call, only what the other carrier told them. The other carrier may also be
passing through calls from another carrier -- there's a lot of traffic mixing
going on.

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dfee
Link to the video:
[https://mobile.twitter.com/cspan/status/1108422307008184326](https://mobile.twitter.com/cspan/status/1108422307008184326)

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argd678
I use google voice to screen my calls, if there was a way on iOS to disable
calls not via Google Voice on my phone that would probably solve the robo call
problem for me.

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azhenley
Context on the recent media coverage of robocalls:

"I Get a Robocall While Making a Video About Robocalls" by Vlogbrothers:
[https://youtu.be/mNIgh3JMDcQ](https://youtu.be/mNIgh3JMDcQ)

"Robocalls" by Last Week Tonight with John Oliver:
[https://youtu.be/FO0iG_P0P6M](https://youtu.be/FO0iG_P0P6M)

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monster2control
HA HA HA HA

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xstephen95x
PR stunt

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lucb1e
True or not, the comment is rather unsubstantiated with just two words.

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reallydude
Most of the comments are unsubstantiated. So what? The sentiment is succinct.
It's a useful contribution insofar that one may upvote, rather than adding to
the noise.

