Beep! Beep! You have Broken the Law. 340
medscaper writes "Authorities in China are using computers to spam mobile phones of law-breakers until they turn themselves in. Apparently, lots of illegal advertisements as stickers with mobile-phone numbers listed are placed around large cities and are becoming an eyesore. So, the authorities call the cell phones incessantly with recorded messages that demand the "businessmen" to turn themselves in."
Hmm... (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:Hmm... (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:Hmm... (Score:4, Insightful)
Ohh and odds are it wasn't mark who put the number in the men's room
Re:Hmm... (Score:3, Insightful)
Yah. The problem here is that the state is accusing, convicting and punishing the criminal without he/she ever getting a chance provide a defense. They are assuming that the posted phone numbers belong to criminals because (presumably) they are the ones that benefit most from the posting.
This (I think) is sort of similar to the problems that were raised with using cameras to spot traffic violations. Early on,
Re:Hmm... (Score:2)
Re:Hmm... (Score:2)
Does this prevent harassing businesses? (Score:3, Insightful)
However, what if its a competing business? If someone calls up XYZ company and says, "I saw your ad, I'd like to buy some of your things.." I'm sure the business in question will be more than happy to oblige them. Is there anything else that could be done to demonstrate that they didn't put the signs up in the first place?
I suppose its the same question in the US without a phone number. Say you print a bunch of stickers with you
Re:Hmm... (Score:5, Informative)
Re:Hmm... (Score:4, Interesting)
From the article
Those who prefer to change their "poisoned" number rather than face punishment incur the fees and inconvenience of switching, and also lose any business their ad might have generated.
So changing the number comes with a pretty high price. Course, I'm "sure" after they get this message, every one goes right in and turns them selves in. I wonder how long it will take before someone figures out how to bypass this.
Law Enforcement in China...well, Hong Kong (Score:5, Interesting)
I'm sure the answer exists somewhere in the middle ... it just seems I was lead to believe in a different future by Adam-12 and Dragnet.
Because cops are too busy making money on drugs. (Score:3, Informative)
How it really works. (Score:2, Insightful)
Hello, locksmith here.
We saw you bills advertising locksmith service, we can post bills for one half price of the competition. Can we send you a quote?
Yes.
Here it comes...
Re:Hmm... (Score:2)
this is answered in the article...
A better question.... (Score:3, Insightful)
With my luck.. (Score:5, Funny)
Re:With my luck.. (Score:4, Funny)
Man, if you think *THAT'S* bad, I have one for you. I was actually in a theater when someone one row ahead of me *PLACED AN OUTGOING CALL*, talking at regular cell-phone volumes (read loud): "Hello, is Justin there ? Could I speak to Justin please ? Is Justin there ?". Everyone in the theater looked at each other, stunned.
I can understand someone forgetting to turn off their cell phones. But being so f*cking ignorant that you would place a call, when you could easily and freely walk to the lobby ? I say bully to the theaters who want to block cell phone signals.
Re:With my luck.. (Score:2)
An AOL tiein for Americans? (Score:3, Funny)
Easy to cause trouble with (Score:5, Insightful)
So, if I don't like someone, all I have to do is make up a few ads with his number on and stick them up places, and the state will spam him for me?
Re:Easy to cause trouble with (Score:3, Informative)
Re:Easy to cause trouble with (Score:4, Informative)
I suppose if your enemy posted up your number all over the place *AND* you answered your phone trying to sell something, you'd get in trouble.
BTW, if you made a few ads and posted them, people interested in the ads would spam the number in response to the ad, regardless of the state's actions
Re:Easy to cause trouble with (Score:2)
Re:Easy to cause trouble with (Score:2, Insightful)
Re:Easy to cause trouble with (Score:2)
Gotta love bathroom stalls.
Re:Easy to cause trouble with (Score:5, Funny)
Dont we all
Re:Easy to cause trouble with (Score:2)
Re:Easy to cause trouble with (Score:2)
"Ad council of America"? I've never even heard of them. In the US, false advertising is only actionable in the most egregious cases of fraud. In particular, it is perfectly OK to make false claims as long as it can't be proven that the claim is false.
Re:Easy to cause trouble with (Score:2)
You can do a lot of things as long as you don't get caught...
I swear.. (Score:3, Interesting)
Proving that you did *not* post bills with your phone number could prove difficult but by that time, you've already racked up 543,766,246,742 voicemails and text messages.
Do they have free incoming text messages in China? I certainly hope so.. in addition to a fine, you'd have a whopping phone bill.
Hrm. maybe Verizon is in on this!
Re:I swear.. (Score:2)
We've got a similar problem here. Every telephone pole in town is covered with a bunch of signs advertising weight loss/appliance repair/whatever.
My favorites are the one that say "Home Internet Business! Make up to $200 a day!". They're invariably hand-written with black marker on a torn piece of cardboard.
Re:I swear.. (Score:2)
Re:I swear.. (Score:2)
Instead of "You've Got Mail" (Score:3, Funny)
Beep Beep. Your Credit Card has been charged... (Score:5, Funny)
You have been fined.... (Score:2)
Good, until... (Score:2)
Or of a police station. That would be great - "Sir, the system we implemented to get rid of those illegal adds is flooding our 911 call center".
Needs work.
BBK
This is the police (Score:3, Funny)
This is the Perp. (Score:4, Funny)
Re:This is the police (Score:5, Funny)
Re:This is the police (Score:3, Funny)
Unfortunately... (Score:5, Funny)
"UShdTrnURslfIn,Lwbrkr"
and no one can figure out what it means. ;)
-T
Re:Unfortunately... (Score:2, Informative)
Re:Unfortunately... (Score:5, Informative)
The difference is that a single character typically represents an "idea" rather than a sound, although there are some cases of the latter, as well. When you can make most words in your language by combining at most 3-4 characters, it is much more efficient to express yourself in writing compared to English, whose average word length is 5 (according to my typing teacher from high school). Added on to that, Asian languages don't use a lot of the "superfluous" words you find in English like definite articles, pronouns, etc. Also, a lot more of the content is picked up by context and left "unwritten".
So, packing all of these language "features" together means that it takes a lot less writing to express exactly the same concept. As a point of reference, Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire is 752 pages in English (paperback edition), and 210 pages in simplified Chinese (also paperback).
p.s. a side note on "predictive text input"
US cell phones have "predictive text input", Chinese and Japanese phones have this as well, and for a much longer time. It is a necessary component of entering any kind of text into a digital device in Asia, and has been constantly researched and developed basically since those languages were available on computers. If you want to try this out, and you have Windows 2000 or XP, try installing the IME for Chinese or Japanese, and playing with it.
Re:Unfortunately... (Score:5, Funny)
Contextual English possible. But make speaker sound Asian.
lots of abbrieviations in Chinese (Score:2)
The counter-example is to wade through Mao's political writings. Never has so much (words) said so little. He uses lots of four-syllable words (two is the average).
Creative Law Enforcement, Possible Issues (Score:4, Insightful)
Or as Ellen Feiss would say... (Score:5, Funny)
ILLEGAL OPERATION (Score:4, Funny)
Re:Or as Ellen Feiss would say... (Score:2, Funny)
Demoliton Man (Score:3, Funny)
John Spartan: Be fucked.
Moral Statute Machine: John Spartan, you are fined one credit for a violation of the Verbal Morality Statute.
[Spartan shoots the machine]
Turn yourself in (Score:5, Funny)
Upon answering the call, the wrongdoer hears the pre-recorded message--
"You have broken the law by posting illegal ads. You must immediately stop this activity and go to the Hangzhou Urban Administrative Bureau for punishment. DO NOT PASS GO, DO NOT COLLECT $200."
I've thought they should do this here for years! (Score:2)
dot.com business model (Score:3, Funny)
1. Place stickers all over Beijing with a 1-900 number for an automated fortune cookie fortune service.
2. Chinese police keep calling you to get you to turn yourself in.
3. Profit!
Denial-of-Service attacks (Score:2)
I'm mad as hell, and I'm not gonna take it anymore (Score:5, Interesting)
At first, I was going to say "why not just turn the phone off?"
But phone being off -> no incoming business calls either. Turn the phone on -> be spammed by police and have your minutes wasted. Turn yourself in -> no more spam + you getting a fine + you no longer hanging stickers.
But couldn't you just block whatever number the cops are calling from?
Re:I'm mad as hell, and I'm not gonna take it anym (Score:2, Insightful)
Manual check? (Score:4, Insightful)
This is the bit I'd be worry about. You'd hate someone to target you and have you taken "for punishment" by pasting a few stickers in your name.
So how effective is the manual check?
Re:Manual check? (Score:3, Funny)
Well, I'd guess it would be fairly effective. Just call the number and say "YES! I'd like to enlarge my (well, you know) by five inches like you said in the ad!"
If they say "Get lost, you pervert!" and hang up, you know somebody was framing them.
Re:Manual check? (Score:2)
i've a brilliant idea (Score:2)
Re:i've a brilliant idea (Score:2, Funny)
Better yet, just post the number on
John: Why don't you answer your phone anymore?
Joe : It got slashdotted last week.
Re:i've a brilliant idea (Score:2)
Fun fun fun (Score:2)
And the "senior official" who approves the "bombardment" better make sure it isn't President Hu Jintao's phone or that of some random army officer...
Article Text - the site is getting slow already (Score:5, Informative)
Officials in Hangzhou, the capital of China's Zhejiang province, have developed a system which bombards mobile phones with pre-recorded voice messages, according to the official newspaper, the People's Daily.
Businessmen who put up illegal advertisements which contain mobile numbers have become the target of the computerized phone-spammer.
According to the report, illegal stickers have become an eyesore in recent years, with China's coastal and urbanized areas blighted with a blizzard of advertisements.
This is because the postcard-sized stickers, which promote everything from fake identity cards to counterfeit academic certifications, are cheap to produce and offer some anonymity.
The new system rings the mobile phone numbers of illegal advertisers at 20-second intervals, said the People's Daily.
Upon answering the call, the wrongdoer hears the pre-recorded message--"You have broken the law by posting illegal ads. You must immediately stop this activity and go to the Hangzhou Urban Administrative Bureau for punishment."
Those who prefer to change their "poisoned" number rather than face punishment incur the fees and inconvenience of switching, and also lose any business their ad might have generated.
The system also dents the advertisers' bottom line as ad respondents are unlikely to get through, thanks to the mobile barrage. As the anti-sticker scheme is newly launched, results have yet to come in, said the report.
Ordinary folks need not worry about being spammed by mistake as the phone numbers are taken from photos of illegal advertisements, said Wei Yunxiang, an official with the Hangzhou Urban Administrative Bureau.
The numbers are also checked manually and require the approval of a senior official before the bombardment can begin, he told the People's Daily.
A better way (Score:3, Interesting)
It may not work the first few times, people thinking it's a joke and no police force would be so cruel, but after the first few times it gets reported by the media and several suicides later, the criminals would get the hint.
Re:A better way (Score:4, Interesting)
I agree that "turn yourself in at your earliest convenience" is a bit dumb, but at least it's not "we know where you live, the phone company told us. Wer'e coming to get you" which is what I'd expect from the Chinese.
from the headline... (Score:5, Funny)
Call blocking (Score:4, Interesting)
I know they have had something like that for a while on land lines here in the U.S. When my sister broke up with an abusive boyfriend she was able to block all calls from his phone number.
Re:Call blocking (Score:2)
--Atlantix
Re:Call blocking (Score:3, Insightful)
Obviously the phone networks won't be allowed to block these numbers, and they won't have caller ID on the DOS originator so local call blocking is useless. I doubt every phone network in China has caller ID, (hell, I can't think of anywhere with that), so blocking non-identifiable numbers i
Re:Call blocking (Score:2)
They can make caller id illegal. Until just a few years ago, caller id was illegal in California (although it was legal in other states). For instance, your sister could have blocked the telephone of her abusive boyfriend, but the boyfriend could have switched to a different pay phone everytime. If there was ever a stupi
Profit (Score:4, Funny)
I wish they'd implement something like this.. (Score:4, Funny)
Re:I wish they'd implement something like this.. (Score:3, Informative)
=Smidge=
Re:I wish they'd implement something like this.. (Score:2)
My aunt had that happen, only she got the ticket instead of her son that was driving the car. That's probably why the photo radar option's not so popular here, though we do have it.
I wish I had a phone numberr I could call so that I could report license plate #'s of ppl who do that. Then, what'd happen is the poli
Re:I wish they'd implement something like this.. (Score:3, Informative)
Too many cases had to be thrown out, due to "Yes, your honor, that is a picture of my car. However I was not driving my car."
"Who was driving your car at that day and time?"
"Well, that was 3 months ago by the time I got the mail and got this court date was set, and I don't remember if I let Marv
Re:I wish they'd implement something like this.. (Score:3, Funny)
Pictures are no longer mailed with the ticket. I would assume that they would be available in court though.
Re:I wish they'd implement something like this.. (Score:2)
Re:I wish they'd implement something like this.. (Score:2)
Re:I wish they'd implement something like this.. (Score:2)
If you're saying that it couldn't be implemented today, I'd tend to agree. It'd take updated phones.
It just struck me as a neat inspiration, not as a well thought out plan. heh.
Location Based Service ? (Score:2, Interesting)
or (shudder) they'll force him to use
Fight SPAM with SPAM (Score:4, Interesting)
The logical extension is to apply the concepts of open source collaboration for email SPAM. Today a shady business can pay $5000 to a spammer to send 10,000,000 emails, and they get a profit because of the 0.01% response rate. Wouldn't it be a lot more fun if they got 10,000,000 emails and 10,000,000 web hits? Then let them try to sort the wheat from the chaff.
Stop filtering, and just hit REPLY
Wait for them to go to the theatre (Score:5, Funny)
Knee jerk reaction (Score:4, Insightful)
However, there is a huge problem with it: If you hate someone all you do is make some fake ads with their phone numbers on and leave them for the Chinese authorities to find and then spam.
Result: an innocent person has a whole lotta shit to clean up.
If the authorities do take some time to investigate the ads (ie actually try phoning the numbers and try to buy the products would be a start) then I think it might be a good way to deal with the criminals who promote their wares.
Similar tactics have been done before against email spammers whereby people find out the spammer's home address and send them junk mail in the post. It pisses the spammers off, but unfortunately finding out the senders of such crap is much more difficult as they don't rely on an email address to take orders with.
Re:Knee jerk reaction (Score:3, Informative)
Yeah, actually...I would say RTFA, but it's the first time I actually read one in five years - I sorta had to to submit it - but it says that the police personally verify all numbers by calling them first before turning this thing on, and even then, a senior administrator has to personally vouch for the number.
So, I guess it's his ass if they goof.
Same here in the Netherlands (Score:5, Interesting)
In the GSM system, there is a SIM card which is linked to your phone number, subscription, etc. You put this card into your phone and use it. The phone itself has a unique identifyer as well, the IMEI number. It was these serial numbers which were used to identify stolen phones. So putting in a new SIM card won't work, because the phone will still identify itself to the network with its IMEI number.
I never saw any report on how sucessfull this was, however. I can imagine that in a lot of cases the owner didn't even know it was stolen (if they bought it second hand)...
Anyways, seems like a good way to harass people who use stolen phones.
Cheers,
Costyn.
Re:Same here in the Netherlands (Score:2, Interesting)
Which is quite easy to understand, as this makes it practically impossible to sell the stolen phone.
Re:Same here in the Netherlands (Score:4, Interesting)
They're already doing this to me here in the US, although my phone wasn't even stolen. By linking sequential phone numbers directly to email addresses, they made it _very_easy_ for spambots to spam the hell out of us.
Does anyone know of a US provider who doesn't use phone numbers as an email id?
For fast and easy service... (Score:3, Interesting)
Possible strategy (Score:2, Redundant)
"Honest officer I didn't post 10,000 stickers all over the city with my cell number on it"
Spam.... (Score:2)
Finally, Law Enforcement that makes Sense.... (Score:5, Interesting)
China's police figured out that jail and fines arent the way to stop most crime. It's all about the psychological punishment of having your phone ring untill your brain explodes. Hopefully more law enforcement agencies will catch on to the use of psycho-enforcement. (yey I coined another buzzword)
-bb
A short play. (Score:2, Funny)
Man: Hello, I've come to turn myself in.
Policeman: {starts laughing}
Man: No really, I have. I feel all dirty and stuff.
Policeman: {points at man, and starts laughing again}
Man: Stop it! Stop it!!
Policeman: {Regains breath. Tries to speak, and starts laughing again}
Man: What's so funny?
Policeman: Get out.
THE END
Better Idea... (Score:2, Insightful)
Hello. I have seen your advertisements and would like to learn more about your products/services since I think there is a high potential of purchasing at a large volume. Please meet me at (location) at (date/time).
Then the police nab them at the location.
Haha, I do that in Canada (Score:2)
Proof of concept code contained within [nettwerked.net].
You could use a nice cold jail cell John Anderton (Score:2)
I better check and make sure my tinfoil hat doesn't have any holes!
Similar problems in VN (Score:5, Interesting)
While this policy didn't seem to be having a discernable effect in HCMC, we didn't see the advertisements (at least not to the same degree) in other large cities (specifically Da Nang, Hue and Hanoi).
Interesting comment (Score:3, Insightful)
This is an interesting statement to be made against spam in general. Those who get spammed incessently have to incur all of the costs, and either suffer through it (as most people do), or lose the revenue/contacts that have the old "poisoned" address.
I think from this point on, I am going to call my addresses that receive 20+ spams a day "poisoned" addresses. Because that is basically what they are.
Re:hehe (Score:4, Interesting)
> That way they don't need to waste cash on messaging the bad-guys
You do think, that the Chinese goverment has to pay for it? The mobile telco has to be thankful to be of assistance to the Chinese People, bringing a culprit to justice. (Not to mention, that the leader of said telcos surely have some relationship with goverment officials)
Re:May be a tad off topic but... (Score:3, Insightful)