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Related storiesExpected HK rate cut nulls interest on small HSBC accts Also featured today U.S. stocks end up in light trade, Dow tops 1100 News Scan P.M.: June
4, 2001 Citron Aims At New
Target Faces In The
News: June 4, 2001 Body Count Update:
June 4, 2001 News Scan: June 4,
2001 Price Controls
Would Worsen California Crisis Top Of The News:
Ford's Move Blows Back Ten O'Clock Tech:
A DSL Phone With A Difference
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Block that Spam Proposed consumer electronics device: the Sony Phone Bouncer, to protect you from telemarketers.The digital age has unleashed a torrent of intrusions on our busy days--junk faxes, junk phone calls, junk e-mails--and a rising tide of legislation to stop it all. The legislation will inevitably fail to keep up with the spammers. But there is hope that private enterprise will protect us.I am inspired to this view by Kiri Blakeley's article ("Caveat Subscriber") on a service called Mailshell. Using this software you create a new electronic identity for every online vendor you do business with. If the e-mail address you give to your stockbroker shows up on an unwelcome solicitation from a time-share resort, you don't need to complain to any federal agency. You fire the broker. Let's have more inventions like this one. I'd like Sony Corp. to introduce a call-blocking answering machine that would work like this. Anybody who dials your number is greeted with "You have reached the home of ----. Please dial your access code." You program the device to ring your phone only if the 4-digit code is on a list you have created. Callers lacking a passcode can do no more than leave a message. You hand out separate codes to people you want to hear from, and make clear that abuse of the information will result in termination of the relationship. I think Sony could put Phone Bouncer on store shelves for $99. Compare this solution to the New York law banning telemarketing pitches to people on a do-not-call list. The feckless law has all manner of exceptions, such as for politicians who want to call, and of course does nothing to protect your sleep from wrong numbers at 2 a.m. AOL has been in the forefront of efforts to stop spam, but I think it could do more. The problem is that some unsolicited communications are genuinely valuable. My solution: a service called Mail Charge. You'd set a fee (say, 50 cents) that AOL would collect from any unfamiliar sender and credit to your account. That would let vital messages get through but thwart the junker who cavalierly dispatches porn pitches to 3 million addresses. Please save us, Sony and AOL, from the spammers. Also from politicians who think they can solve our problems. Reader's ResponsesA Phone Bouncer to stop the horrific flood of telemarketing calls? If Sony (or anyone else) takes him up on it, I'll be the first to buy it.Peter Vanderwicken Carversville, Pa. You can easily get rid of pests: simply respond to spam by hitting reply and send them whatever invectives you wish. Same with unwanted mail; fill the business reply envelope with any scrap paper that fits into it, tape it shut and send off. Judy Rosner Elmhurst, Ill.
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