[Article by SBP] Eircom to refund autodialler victim

damien

Eircom to refund autodialler victim
03/10/04
By Kathleen Barrington

Eircom has promised to refund €546 to a Dublin customer who was victim to an autodialler scam after The Sunday Business Post highlighted her case with the company. Breffni O'Rourke received a bill last May which was almost €300 more than her usual bill of €150. She demanded an itemised bill for the two month billing period and found it included calls to the Solomon Islands and New Zealand. O'Rourke discovered she had been the victim of autodialler fraud, which has affected about 360 people already this year.

The fraud happens when fraudsters hack into the system, divert calls to long distance destinations and collect a proportion of the higher call charges they then clock up. The higher call charges are generated by settings on certain websites which change internet access settings from a local to an international number, without the knowledge of the user. When Eircom informed O'Rourke that she was liable for the charges, she contacted a solicitor, who advised her that she was liable for the bill.

She agreed to pay Eircom €10 a week to pay off her bill, but when she missed a payment, Eircom cut off her landline. She paid the bill in full and service was restored, but she asked Eircom to block her international dialling facility to prevent future fraud. Eircom charged her a fee of €24 to block international calls and a recurring charge of €5.08 every two months for the service. Eircom said this weekend it would refund O'Rourke the cost of the fraud after she contacted this newspaper.

David McRedmond, the commercial director of Eircom, said the company reviewed autodialler fraud on a case by case basis. For information on how to prevent autodialler fraud contact www.comreg.ie

Anyone know of any other victims of this ? Perhaps they too should contact the SBP and see what Eircom does then ?

lucernarian

Im sure McRedmond will twist this into how much Eircom "cares for its customers". Why don't they just refund everyone? It will save them the public humiliation of being forced by the media to refund every customer one by one when they complain to the SBP

damien

To_be_confirmed wrote:

Im sure McRedmond will twist this into how much Eircom "cares for its customers". Why don't they just refund everyone? It will save them the public humiliation of being forced by the media to refund every customer one by one when they complain to the SBP

When these porn dialers starting dialing the numbers in far off lands Eircom created band 13 which was basically a porn dialler band, and the costs to dial this band rocketed in price. Is that caring for the customer ?

dub45

Just as a slight diversion is there no way to 'lock' the default isp in? so that if it was being changed the user would be notified or asked for permission for it to happen?

seamus

dub45 wrote:

Just as a slight diversion is there no way to 'lock' the default isp in? so that if it was being changed the user would be notified or asked for permission for it to happen?

It's possible in Windows NT,2000 or XP, but many home users would still be using 95/98 and most others wouldn't have a clue how to prevent in any other OS.

SeaSide

damien.m wrote:

When these porn dialers starting dialing the numbers in far off lands Eircom created band 13 which was basically a porn dialler band, and the costs to dial this band rocketed in price. Is that caring for the customer ?

Just for the record these charges are determined by the termination rate that the countries charge. I would say that the money eircom make from this would fall into the not worth all the hassle category.

Moriarty

Have a read of this thread, SeaSide. Every other european telco charges much less than half of the rates eircom charge. Much more than half of that €3.60 per minute goes directly into eircom's pockets.

SeaSide

BT charge equivalent of Euro2.63 per minute to call Vanuatu. 3.6/2.6=1.4 quite far away from double.

At the end of the financial period both countries will calculate the balance of payments - that is offset the calls made from Ireland against calls made to Ireland. At a guess I would say that the there are not that many calls being made to Ireland so eircom or BT or any other telco would not be pocketing as much from it as given in the discussion following the FAQ but still a significant amount probably Euro 1 - 1.50.

There is a very strict control maintained over adult content premium numbers in Ireland by RegTel if I'm correct. They are basically banned and as always whenever something is banned a way will be found around it - hence these international services. If adults want to access these services that is not my business - if you want to make it yours thats fine. This is where there is an error in the FAQ. The call does not appear as a premium rate call but as an international call.

The rogue diallers issue I would suggest is seperate entirely from this. It is clearly fraud. My original point and forgive me if I misunderstood the point that was being made was that eircom will, and I stand to be corrected on this, not make a huge amount from modem hijacking and that the money they make from this will be more than offset by the hassle that this will cause.

I would also say that they probably do make a big chunk of cash from the pornographic content side and if the discussion revolves around wanting to ban this activity that as I said is up to you.

Ripwave

SeaSide wrote:

BT charge equivalent of Euro2.63 per minute to call Vanuatu.

According to this table EsatBT charge €1.30/m during the day, and 70c/m nights and weekends.

3.6/2.6=1.4 quite far away from double.

3.6/.7 = 5.1 - you're right, it is far away from double!

billy the squid

I'm just curious, These porn dialers are obtaining money from customers without their concent, would this be classed as defrauding that person.

If eircom refuses to refund customers who have been defrauded then could they be proscecuted for making money from an illegal activity.

And before someone says "prove it" Surely there is a database of these fraudulent numbers somewhere, say like in germany where they have already taken measures to stop these diallers.

I mean, eircom did not need to create band 13 did they,

BrianD

The problem Billy is that Eircom is not defrauding anybody as they do not supply or install the autodialler on the consumers equipment. The telecoms companies are not responsible in the host country as they are not necessarily aware how the company who leases the line will drive their traffic. I am sure they are in no doubt how it happens but they don't (so far as I am aware) supply or install the software in question. At the same time ISPs bear no responsibility for the fraud though have been very inactive in educating their customers to this type of fraud.

Much has been made about Eircoms high prices to BAnd 13 countries and that the are some what complicit in the scam. In reality, this is deflecting responsibility away from the root and solution of the problem - the computer user (assuming we are unable to identify the autodialler promoters). Even if Eircom reduced their rates in line with other operators or indeed other international bands, the PC user who has an autodialler onboard is still facing a large phone bill.

There seems to be no appetite by any party to identify those behind the autodialler fraud and no doubt this would be a difficult task. ComRegs Directive 2 will be lucky to last 6 months and is a drastic response to the issue. Having said that it will certainly put pressure on Band 13 countries to regulate their industry as they will be afraid that other countries will follow suit. They can start by having a register of users that will allow the owners of lines to be identified with the possibility of legal redress by an autodialler victim. Lines that have a history of autodialler use could be closed down and their promoters blocked from using lines in the future. However, you will simply have a re-run of the building trade in Ireland - declare your bankrupt, closedown and start over again.

Directive 1 could be expanded to require ISP's to provide suitable software or equipment to prevent autodiallers from installing on their PC. The cost would be borne by the PC user. An educated and suitable equipped PC consumer is the key to ending this type of fraud.

oscarBravo

SeaSide wrote:

At the end of the financial period both countries will calculate the balance of payments - that is offset the calls made from Ireland against calls made to Ireland. At a guess I would say that the there are not that many calls being made to Ireland so eircom or BT or any other telco would not be pocketing as much from it as given in the discussion following the FAQ but still a significant amount probably Euro 1 - 1.50.

Is that how international interconnects work? I'm genuinely curious, as I have no idea.

SeaSide wrote:

There is a very strict control maintained over adult content premium numbers in Ireland by RegTel if I'm correct. They are basically banned and as always whenever something is banned a way will be found around it - hence these international services.

Adult premium services are banned? Seems unlikely. If you have a source for this, I'd love to see it.

SeaSide wrote:

If adults want to access these services that is not my business - if you want to make it yours thats fine. This is where there is an error in the FAQ. The call does not appear as a premium rate call but as an international call.

I think the FAQ is referring to porn diallers in general, as opposed to the scumbaggery involved in band 13 dialler hijacking.

SeaSide wrote:

The rogue diallers issue I would suggest is seperate entirely from this. It is clearly fraud. My original point and forgive me if I misunderstood the point that was being made was that eircom will, and I stand to be corrected on this, not make a huge amount from modem hijacking and that the money they make from this will be more than offset by the hassle that this will cause.

Can you elaborate on the interconnect arrangement you described earlier? Specifically the "balance of payments" concept. Leaving that aside for a moment, you suggest that Eircom are making at least €1-1.50 per minute from these calls. Just how much hassle does it take to offset that kind of money? Bear in mind also that the hassle is a relatively recent introduction to the situation.

SeaSide wrote:

I would also say that they probably do make a big chunk of cash from the pornographic content side and if the discussion revolves around wanting to ban this activity that as I said is up to you.

It's not about banning adult content; it's about fraudulent activities that cause people to be charged for something they didn't intentionally do. It's also about the morality of a telco profiteering from this type of activity.

oscarBravo

BrianD wrote:

The problem Billy is that Eircom is not defrauding anybody as they do not supply or install the autodialler on the consumers equipment. The telecoms companies are not responsible in the host country as they are not necessarily aware how the company who leases the line will drive their traffic. I am sure they are in no doubt how it happens but they don't (so far as I am aware) supply or install the software in question. At the same time ISPs bear no responsibility for the fraud though have been very inactive in educating their customers to this type of fraud.

So the only one who should bear the responsibility for this crime is the victim? What a caring society you would have us live in.

BrianD wrote:

Much has been made about Eircoms high prices to BAnd 13 countries and that the are some what complicit in the scam.

I don't think anyone has accused Eircom of complicity, and it's disingenuous of you - at best - to suggest that they have. What Eircom have been accused of is profiteering from fraudulent activities. I believe that you have, in the past, defended their right to do so.

dahamsta

oscarBravo wrote:

So the only one who should bear the responsibility for this crime is the victim? What a caring society you would have us live in.

I tried to explain this to Brian recently, he chose to ignore it. This is typical of users like Brian, who are always welcome on my Ignore list.

adam

spongebob

oscarBravo wrote:

I don't think anyone has accused Eircom of complicity, and it's disingenuous of you - at best - to suggest that they have.

Speaking for me only . I accused Eircom of Fraud and Complicity before Band 13 was activated. I have not changed my mind about the matter in the past 2 years and believe that Comreg were quite right to do what they did....and should have done it 2 years ago .

I believe that you have, in the past, defended their right to do so.

BrianD sounds like Dave Mc Redmonds b33tch in here most of the time . One wonders why he goes to such lengths to defend this fraud, one really really does .

We ALL agree that people should run their patches Brian. It is impossible to do so if you are on 12k DialUp in the West and have a 200Mb XP Service Pack 2 staring at you ! Patches (in Ireland) must generally be accessed over dialup . They are much too big for dialup . Touché ! Funny how these dialup pcs have a modem installed !

If we all had 1mbit BB as standard it should be legally mandatory to be patched up within 24 hours but that would be a fortuitous reality for us in this country would it not

M

oscarBravo

Muck wrote:

Speaking for me only . I accused Eircom of Fraud and Complicity before Band 13 was activated.

I stand corrected. Feck ye. To me, complicity suggests that they sat down with them and planned it together, which I don't believe. I do believe that they deliberately profiteered from a fraudulent activity - call that what you will.

spongebob

oscarBravo wrote:

I do believe that they deliberately profiteered from a fraudulent activity - call that what you will.

The extortion through fraud scheme that is Band 13 was announced by Eircom in October 2002 and became active on the 01/11/2002. I accused Eircom of Committing Fraud in October 2002 Before Band 13 became active and suggested remedies not a million miles from what Comreg suggested in August 2004 .

BrianD Here is the October 2002 Fraud Alert For the Slow Learner! .

M

BrianD

Muck - apology please. Do not refer to me or anybody else on this board as a "bitch". How dare you! PUBLIC APOLOGY REQUIRED NOW. The only slow learner around here is you. I suggest you read the FAQs yourself and inform yourself. Your posting in the link is laughable. I suggest that you make your allegation directly to Eircom but don't ask the rest of us to have a whip round to support you when you lose. Because, as you know, you will.

BTW there is plenty of ways an ISP can deliver a patch or software solution to the computer user.

I don't defend the fraud, I am against the rantings on this board that suggest that everybody other than the PC USER and the fraudsters are responsible for the continuation of this activity. The consumer by taking control and responsibility for their equipment can prevent this scam. Wake up to the real world for once and the notion for personal responsibility.

seamus

All I can hear is "Blah blah blah Blah blah blah Blah blah blah Blah blah Blah blah blah Blah blah Blah blah blah Blah blah Blah blah blah Blah blah Blah blah blah Blah blah Blah blah blah Blah blah Blah blah blah Blah blah Blah blah blah Blah blah Blah blah blah Blah blah"

Locked. Ye brought it on yourselves. Don't start it again.

sceptre

Keeping in mind that I'm not supposed to be a moderator here any more, I'd like to remind people that the "Report This Post" button (looks like a warning triangle) is still present on all posts. If a user feels they've been insulted or is aggrieved by a post in a way a moderator should be made aware of, clicking this and reporting it and only doing that is a better method to resolve the issue rather than insulting the other poster back and starting one of those flame wars that get threads locked or users banned. I'm all for reality, reasonable and appropriate respect and, more importantly, progress. Anything else is a waste of my limited time.

As for Damien's original posted article, "case by case basis" (McRedmond) or not, it's a potential precedent assuming there's nothing magical to distinguish O'Rourke's case other than her contacting the SBP. As for the 5.08 bi-monthly tax on international call barring, let's bring that up at a time when we're willing to discuss it like big people.