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I have T-mobile and I have recently noticed a steep drop in the number of calls about extending a warranty or a recording of somebody speaking in Chinese….
 
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On this carrier and got a call about my expiring warranty (for my 10 year old car) yesterday (normally about 1 a day), will be interesting to see if this does a thing. If its only labeling, its close to worthless.

It does make me wonder if we really need phone numbers at this point, at the height of this nonsense (and inability or lack of motivation of the carriers to fix it), a full size ipod touch with connection through a wireless provider (but no phone number) was sounding pretty good.

Ahhh for actual blockage, you have to get their app, it appears, and it (according the app store) harvests your contact info, usage data and user content (whatever that is) along with other stuff not directly linked the user (but probably easily linked later on).

How annoying. That full size ipod touch with a wireless connection but no phone number anyone can call sounds better at every turn.
It doesn't block spam calls, it just guarantees that the number displayed is the actual number they're calling from. You don't need their app, and it doesn't "harvest" your contact info (unless you want it to).
 
I have TMobile and have had the scamshield turned on for months. It says it blocks the “scam likely” calls, but lots more still come through. “Frank from Alarm plus” still called me twice in the past hour from 2 different numbers, so I’m not sure what Stir/shaken is supposed to do exactly. Will it allow them to really stop number spoofing once all carriers have it rolled out?
 
when overall compared to other major companies they are trash.

Where's your supporting data? Consumer Reports gives T-Mobile an 81, Verizon 73, AT&T 69. [Their top rated carrier is Consumer Cellular, with an 89].

Tom's Guide rates them #1:


With 5G it is a whole new world. T-Mobile has the most mid band spectrum due to the Sprint acquisition. Verizon & AT&T made the wrong choice emphasizing mmW over Mid Band. mmW is really only useful in dense environments. It has severe limitations, not going through walls, etc.

Verizon realized their mistake and just bought a lot of mid band in the latest auction. Whether or it will bridge the huge 5G gap with T-Mobile remains to be seen.

T-Mobile 5G superiority keeps increasing. Some industry analysts say that Verizon and AT&T will never be able to catch up.

Of course coverage varies and T-Mobile might not be the best in your local market.
 
I created a car warranty scam caller contact and blocked it, and now just add those numbers to it. I hadn’t cleaned out my voicemails in awhile so I had a good start on them. It seemed to have helped, although I could have used the warranty on my dead 08 Prius a few weeks ago. RIP Tomato 🍅
 
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I am kind of getting to a point of can Apple just add it into their iPhone like Google does with the Pixel. That is like one of the biggest features I am missing from the iPhone when I switch.
As for T-Mobile good now can they make AT&T Verizon offer this for free as well. it cost them nothing but the shear fact that they are so greedy to turn it on is sad.
 
I wish there was even more that could be done to stop these scumbags. If there is a confirmed scammer then wouldn't it just be lovely if they could automatically be bombarded with the equivalent of a DNS attack, or maybe there could be provisions in the cell phone plans that if a number is being used for scamming then the calls are charged, not free. There just doesn't appear to be any way to *effectively* punish these guys...
What needs to be done to these scammers is this:
  • Find out who they are and where they are located. There are several videos on YouTube where "Jim Browning" was able to locate several call centers using his own private means; if he can do it, more could be found with resources of the government.
  • Send Special Ops team to round them up and capture them.
  • Torture them using methods used by Spanish Inquisition back in the day: i.e. cut off one finger at a time, tie them up to the truck and drag them through the streets, tie them up to 4 horses or cars/trucks and tear them apart, eventually killing them.
  • Film scenes of their torture and death and post them online on sites like YouTube, etc. for everyone (and especially other scammers or would-be scammers) to see, along with a tagline "If you keep scamming innocent people, YOU ARE NEXT!"
And before you say that what I am suggesting is inhumane and/or barbaric, think about all the damage these scammers are doing to innocent people. When "IRS" once called a single mother who was crying into the phone saying that she couldn't find money to feed her kids, you think they flinched? Or you think that "Windows Technical Support" thought twice before stealing some poor old lady's last $30,000 life savings? The list goes on and on.

This will only stop when we put fear of torture and death into heads of these scammers. For every single call blocking schemes they will always find a way around it. They need to know that if they keep on doing this, they will suffer and die.
 
BTW, a large number of the spam/scam calls I get are from T-Mobile numbers, so obviously they cannot even police their own network.
The scam calls you're getting have a forged CID; how can you possibly tell what carrier they are from? Most scam calls are coming from some sort of IP telephony service and NOT from any kind of cellular phone.

I'm calling BS on this story.
 
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Does the app even do anything? I downloaded it before. All it seems to do is give me an interface to turn the feature on or off. Which I already had turned on through the website. So, the app seemed superfluous and I removed it.
No you don’t need the app. As you’ve found, the website has the same exact feature as this is a network-level setting!

Works for me
The app showing you a number that the network blocked doesn’t mean the app itself blocked the call. You could have enabled the same feature from tmobile’s website and never even installed the app, and those 2 calls would still have been blocked.

Why do we need an App for that ? Shouldn't it be part of the infrastructure ?
You don’t and it is.

I have no idea why T-Mobile has decided to push this app so much given its redundancy. Do they think customers can’t handle a website? Is is because their website is awful to navigate and they know it? Is there a nefarious purpose to the app? It makes one wonder...
 
Me and Scam Likely are tight...like this.


IMG_0958.jpeg
 
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No you don’t need the app. As you’ve found, the website has the same exact feature as this is a network-level setting!


The app showing you a number that the network blocked doesn’t mean the app itself blocked the call. You could have enabled the same feature from tmobile’s website and never even installed the app, and those 2 calls would still have been blocked.


You don’t and it is.

I have no idea why T-Mobile has decided to push this app so much given its redundancy. Do they think customers can’t handle a website? Is is because their website is awful to navigate and they know it? Is there a nefarious purpose to the app? It makes one wonder...
I think the main point of the app is to try and upsell people on the paid spam options. By listing what you could do. If you pay more.
 
If only they could stop the car warranty calls. Occasionally I do have to answer my phone while on the job and they got me yesterday.
If I have nothing better to do at the moment, I pick up and tell them that I would like to extend the warranty on the following 3 vehicles: Abrams M1, Merkava and Armata. I usually get puzzled sound from the lowlife in the other end.
 
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At least T-Mobile does it. I use Visible which is T-Mobile so I’m good.
Do you really use Visible? If you did, you'd know that Visible is Verizon


Hi, we’re Visible. We’re the wireless service that gets better with friends (like our friend Kevin Bacon). Get legit unlimited data, powered by Verizon, for as little as $25/mo. Taxes and fees included! And if you bring one of those friends every month, you get every month for $5.
 
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On this carrier and got a call about my expiring warranty (for my 10 year old car) yesterday (normally about 1 a day), will be interesting to see if this does a thing. If its only labeling, its close to worthless.

It does make me wonder if we really need phone numbers at this point, at the height of this nonsense (and inability or lack of motivation of the carriers to fix it), a full size ipod touch with connection through a wireless provider (but no phone number) was sounding pretty good.

Ahhh for actual blockage, you have to get their app, it appears, and it (according the app store) harvests your contact info, usage data and user content (whatever that is) along with other stuff not directly linked the user (but probably easily linked later on).

How annoying. That full size ipod touch with a wireless connection but no phone number anyone can call sounds better at every turn.
No. You don’t need the app for full protection. You just enable scam blocking by calling #662# or enabling it online. The app is just for a counter or to use extra filters they charge for, and you don’t have to enable contacts if you don’t want to.

STIR/SHAKEN is network level by default. Except on iOS the behaviour is stupid in that it doesn’t show you on the call screen if it’s a verified number — it only shows in call details in the Phone app *after* answering or declining.
 
I don't need to tell myself anything. I'm capable of independent thought and critical thinking.

Att is actually the worst. I had att and ported to Verizon a month back . Used to get around 8 to 10 spam/warranty/Marriott calls since last 5 years, with att call protection on. Now on Verizon I hardly get 1 every few days. Again have the call filter is turned on. (On both att and Verizon I had the free version)
 
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