How can I legally identify pesky robocallers?

Question

I am planning to move to New Hampshire soon, and one of the great benefits of living there is that unlike most states, private citizens can prosecute misdemeanors. That means once I become a New Hampshire resident I can summon and bring to court people or organizations that are breaking the law, so long as the law is a misdemeanor and I am the aggrieved party.

So, what kind of criminal organization am I thinking about? Robocallers of course!!!

In New Hampshire, the Federal laws concerning illegally calling someone on the Do-Not-Call (DNC) list are replicated by local statute. That means the criminal penalties for illegally calling somebody on the DNC in New Hampshire are legally actionable. I think the penalty is $1500 per call or something like that.

So, my only problem is identifying the perps. Obviously if they are in Pakistan there is nothing I can do, but a lot of "Rachel" calls apparently originate in the US and are made by US-based organizations. Can I just subpoena the phone company to get true of the identity of the caller, or is it going to be more complicated than that?

I know I can get an answer here by just starting an action in court and I am sure the phone company's lawyer will explain everything to me, but I am hoping somebody here is an expert in call tracing and give me the lowdown on how to do criminal phone tracing ahead of time so I have a leg up on the process.

Answer 1

There is no effective way for ordinary people to trace back these calls, never mind obtain compensation from the callers. Calls are initiated by a foreign entity (boiler room in Delhi or Karachi, for instance), backhauled through the internet, and translated to POTS locally to the target. The latter is a generic service used by all modern long distance carriers; backhauling is used by every phone room service, foreign or domestic (call your ISP's support line sometime during off hours and listen for the accent on the other end), and there are no international treaties extending American telephone law to foreign companies.

Backhauling is converting a call to digital (if it didn't start as VOIP), and transmitting it between POPs (Points of Presence) via the Internet. If you live in New York City and dial an Anchorage number, your call will be on analog lines, at most, to your telco's POP, where it will be digitized and transmitted over the Internet backbone to a POP in Anchorage, where it's demodulated onto an analog line for the "last mile" to your target's phone. If you were to call Fairbanks, you'd insert a hop via satellite into that path, as might be the case if you call Karachi or Beijing.

The salient point is digital conversion -- to trace the call back, you'd need to know what POP the local leg originated from, then capture at least one packet and read its headers to learn the originating IP address (which is likely another POP), then find out (from that POP -- which would require its cooperation) what if any analog line brought the call in on that end (if it started as VOIP, all you'll get is an IP address and maybe a whois link).

All of this is complicated by caller ID spoofing -- which would require that the trace be done while the offending caller is on the line in order to have access to the backhaul packets. It likely would require the local telco's equipment to be in on the operation, as well.

The best you might be able to do is block repeated calls from the same source, but they spoof a different number (often one local your phone) for each individual call, so blocking individual numbers gains nothing (other than ensuring your neighbors can't call you, since spoofed numbers are often valid, in-use destinations).

Until cell and landline phone carriers want to stop spam calling (like ISPs wanted to stop spam) technology that exists (for instance, packet tracing the backhaul stage) won't happen, and these methods aren't available to the call recipients. If you could get a million people to switch phone carriers because of spam calls, it might have some effect -- but most likely they'd just be churning between the same three or four carriers, who wouldn't even notice.

Answer 2

Bell Canada had a "star" (*) code to work interactively with the automated telephone relays for individual-line residence and business where it is technically possible. Contact your provider to see if there is a similar system in New Hamster that might help.

It is called "Call Trace" available for a $5 fee per use. It works regardless of caller number blocking. You pay only if the call is successfully traced. It was mandated by the Canadian Government a while ago and immediately involved the police.

1. As soon as the offensive call is terminated, hang up.
2. Pick up and listen for a dial-tone.
3. Press *57.
4. A voice message will tell you if the call has been successfully traced.
5. Hang up.
6. If the call has been traced and you wish to have the caller legally charged, contact the local police department. Remember that a traced number will only be given to the police and only if they provide the phone company with proper legal authorization. (That's your intention to pursue legally to prosecute. You have to contact the police to start the process after your call.)

For what it's worth, the explicit instructions for the national (US and Canada) "DO NOT CALL LIST" are

1. Say, "Put me on your do not call list."
2. Note the date
3. Keep records
4. Contact the authorities if they call within 1 year.

The Bell Canada representative I called said that an unlisted number was one alternative; but, that it was not effective with autodialers and call blocking for up to 12 numbers which wasn't 100% effective. Call screening was another but had access disadvantages for anyone not on your limited acceptable calls list.

Good luck