How to Prevent Calls from Telemarketers (USA)

Limit the amount of personal information that you provide to "strangers". If someone asks for your name and address, they can easily find your phone number from the telephone directory. Protect your personal information as "need-to-know".^[1]

Do not call to respond to general media advertisements, television or newspaper ads. The company can legitimately collect your number, through caller ID, and may illegitimately share it with other companies.

Learn about the privacy policy of any company that collects your personal information. If a company cannot guarantee that they will not sell or share your phone number or other information, do not do business with them at all.^[2]

Do not provide your phone number in product registrations. Leave that line blank if it is allowed.

Register your phone number with the FTC's National Do Not Call list. You may register three personal phone numbers at a time, including cell phone numbers.^[3]

You may call 1-888-382-1222 from the phone you want to register as an alternative to the Internet method for the Do Not Call Registry.^[4]

Be careful with whom you do business. Some companies violate the Do Not Call registry by falsely stating that you have recently transacted business with them or that you have an active account with their company.

Do not hire any third-party companies to register your phone numbers with the Do Not Call list. This is a scam. A telemarketer calls your number to sell you anti-telemarketing services? Yep.

Most companies must remove you from their calling list when you request it. When speaking to a telemarketer, ask for the name of the company and the name of the person to whom you are speaking. Ask for a phone number for the company, so that you can confirm that the call is legitimate. Then, politely and firmly say, "Place me on your do not call list."

Report telemarketing violations and suspected scams to the Federal Trade Commission and your state Attorney General.^[5]

Use Google. Entering an unknown number in a search engine may give you some hints about its owner. Many online report services also allow you to report and share your experience with other users.

Setup phone call filtering. Most phone companies offer "anonymous call rejection". If the calling party is not displaying caller id information for whatever reason your phone will not ring. Instead the calling party will be confronted by a phone company system that will do one or more of the following: prompt the caller to release caller id information, prompt the caller to leave a very short voice message which is subsequently played to you giving you a chance to accept or dump the call, instruct the caller to call back revealing caller id information. This will weed out a great many collections calls. There are a number of hardware devices that can accomplish this without invoking a monthly fee.^[6]

Setup your phone system as WhiteList-Only. _ Numbers not on your approved list will not ring your phone. As collection agencies often employ caller id spoofing, sending fake- or alternate caller id information to trick you into answering. However, WhiteList-Only home phone setup puts a swift end to this [illicit] collections terrorism. _ WhiteList-Only can be accomplished with a hardware device for as little as $50USD with no monthly fees. Alternatively once can switch phone service from Land Lind (conventional phone system) to VoIP (Voice over IP). The latter requires an internet connection and performs best on a broadband link; dial-up internet is generally unworkable. There are a variety of home VoIP providers allowing WhiteList-Only setup for as little as $8 USD monthly. _ If one is adventurous one can setup a home PBX using Asterisk, an open source software phone system usually requiring a dedicated computer. PBX in a Flash is one such flavor of Asterisk and is well suited to the above average computer user. Consider the free (open source software) PBX in a flash, Orgasmatron build, for easy "out of the box" FULL CONTROL of YOUR home phone. Your Phone, your time, YOUR TERMS. _ WhiteList-only has the further advantage of being able to list your contact number publicly [physically or on the interweb] with the guarantee that you will not receive calls from unknown parties.

Setup your phone system as BlackList unwanted. Similar to WhiteList-only BlackList allows all calls except those explicitly blocked. Land Line phone service typically limits the customer to twenty blocked numbers whereas home VoIP providers or home PBX has no such limit. Additionally the latter two often allow wildcard blacking. This allows one to block all calls from toll free numbers: 800*, 866*, 877*, 888*. As most collection agencies start harassing from toll free numbers one greatly reduces the amount of harassment with a few rules. One has a wide variety of options how to handle blocked callers, whether in WhiteList- or BlackList mode: always busy, infinite ring, fake out of service error, voicemail prompt that does not allow messages to be recorded, and even redirecting callers to another number.^[7]