http://www.snopes.com/politics/business/cell411.asp
Celling Your Soul
Claim: Cell phone users must register their numbers with the national "Do Not Call" directory to prevent their cell phone numbers from being released to telemarketers.
Status: False.
Examples:
[Collected on the Internet, 2006]
Greetings To All of My Friends and Family
In just 4 days from today all U. S. cell phone numbers will be released to telemarketing companies and you will begin to receive sales calls. You will be charged for these calls! Even if you do not answer, the telemarketer will end up in your voice mail and you will be charged for all of the minutes the incoming (usually recorded) message takes to complete. You will then also be charged when you call your voice mail to retrieve your messages.
To prevent this, call 888-382-1222 from your cell phone. This is the national DO NOT CALL list; it takes only a minute to register your cell phone number and it blocks most telemarketers calls for five years.
In case you have friends other than me, pass this on to them.
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[Collected on the Internet, 2005]
JUST A REMINDER... 31 days from today, cell phone numbers are being released to telemarketing companies and you will start to receive sales calls. YOU WILL BE CHARGED FOR THESE CALLS...
To prevent this, call the following number from your cell phone: 888-382-1222. It is the national DO NOT CALL list. It will only take a minute of your time. It blocks your number for five (5) years.
PASS THIS ON TO ALL YOUR FRIENDS
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[Collected on the Internet, 2004]
A directory of cell phone numbers will soon be published for all consumers to have access to. This will open the doors for solicitors to call you on your cell phones, using up the precious minutes that we pay lots of money for. The Federal Trade Commission has set up a "do not call" list. It is called a cell phone registry. To be included on the "do not call" list, you must call from the number you wish to register.
The number is 1-888-382-1222 or you can go to their website at
www.donotcall.gov.
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[Collected on the Internet, 2004]
Starting Jan 1, 2005, all cell phone numbers will be made public to telemarketing firms. So this means as of Jan 1, your cell phone may start ringing off the hook with telemarketers, but unlike your home phone, most plans pay for your incoming calls. These telemarketers will eat up your free minutes and end up costing money. According to the National Do Not Call List, you have until Dec 15, 2004 to get on the national "Do Not Call List" for cell phones. You can either call 1-888-382-1222 from the cell phone that you wish to have put on the "do not call list" or you can do it online at
www.donotcall.gov.
Registering only takes a minute, is in effect for 5 years. All of you will need to register before Dec 15. You may want to also do your own personal cell phones.
Origins: Despite dire warnings about the imminent release of cell phone numbers to telemarketers that continue to be circulated via e-mail year after year, no such thing is about to occur,
nor do cell phone users have to register their cell phone numbers with the national Do Not Call registry before a soon-to-pass deadline to head off an onslaught of telemarketing calls. The panic-inducing e-mails (which circulate especially widely every January, since many versions of the warning list the end of that month as a cut-off date for registering cell phone numbers with the national Do Not Call registry) have grown out of a misunderstanding about the proposed creation of a wireless directory assistance service.
Cell phone numbers have generally been excluded from printed telephone books and directory assistance services. However, since the use of cell phones has burgeoned in recent years (to the point that many people no longer maintain landline phone service), several national wireless companies (AllTel, AT&T Wireless, Cingular, Nextel, Sprint PCS, and T-Mobile) have banded together and hired Qsent, Inc. to produce a Wireless 411 service. Their goal is to pool their listings to create a comprehensive directory of cell phone customer names and phone numbers that would be made available to directory assistance providers.
Many cell phone customers are opposed to the proposed Wireless 411 service for a number of reasons:
They prefer the privacy of knowing that their cell phone numbers are available only to those to whom they provide them. They don't want other people being able to obtain their cell phone numbers without their consent or knowledge.
They are concerned that their cell phone numbers will be sold to telemarketers (or other groups that might make undesirable use of those numbers).
They see one of the goals of the Wireless 411 service as a ploy to spread cell phone numbers to wider circles of friends and acquaintances, who will then place calls to cell phones and thereby force cell customers to pay for additional wireless minutes.
The wireless companies behind the proposed Wireless 411 service contend that their service will be beneficial to cellular customers and that they have addressed those customers' major concerns:
The service would save money for the millions of customers who have cellular phones and currently pay to have their cell phone numbers listed in phone directories.
The Wireless 411 service will be strictly "opt-in" that is, cell phone customers will be included in the directory only if they specifically request to be added. The phone numbers of wireless customers who do nothing will not be included, those who choose to be listed can have their numbers removed from the directory if they change their minds, and there is no charge for requesting to be included or choosing not to be included.
The Wireless 411 information will not be included in printed phone directories, distributed in other printed form, made available via the Internet, or sold to telemarketers. It will be made available only to operator service centers performing the 411 directory assistance service.
All of these points have been summed up in numerous media articles, such as the following from the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel:
There is a grain of truth in the message making it believable, but it's wrong on two counts: Not all cell phone numbers will be listed in the national directory planned for 2006. And telemarketers will not have access to the directory. It is illegal for marketers using auto-dialers and most do to call wireless phone numbers.
Here's the truth:
A national directory will be compiled, but numbers will be included on an opt-in basis. If a cell phone subscriber does nothing, the number will not be listed. When the directory is ready, it will be available only as part of the existing 411 directory service, accessed by calling in and asking for a specific number. It will not be published in a book or on the Internet. And it will not be sold to telemarketers.
Cell phone subscribers can list their numbers on the do-not-call registry if they choose, but there is no deadline to get on the list, as the e-mail messages now circulating suggest Nonetheless, many consumers don't trust the Wireless 411 consortium to uphold their promises, and although Qsent and its clients plan to make the Wireless 411 service available sometime in 2006, its implementation is far from certain as the wireless companies are still contesting proposed legislation which seeks to regulate wireless phone directories.
So, although the gist of some warnings are correct in alerting consumers to a proposed directory of cell phone numbers, they are misleading in stating that such a directory will "soon be published" (the word "published" implies making a printed directory available, which the wireless consortium maintains they will not do) and in directing readers to sign up with the The National Do Not Call Registry. The latter step will not keep wireless customer listings out of the proposed Wireless 411 database it will only add their phone numbers to a list of numbers off-limits to most telemarketers, a step which is premature (because the Wireless 411 directory has not yet been implemented) and largely unnecessary (because the Wireless 411 directory information is not supposed to be supplied to telemarketers, and because FCC regulations already in place block the bulk of telemarketing calls to cell phones).
Some versions of the exhortation to cell phone users to add their names to the Do Not Call Registry erroneously state there is a specific deadline for getting listed. Says Lois Greisman, the Federal Trade Commission official who oversees the anti-telemarketing registry: "There is no deadline; there never has been a deadline to register."
Adding one's cell phone number to the National Do Not Call Registry won't have any adverse effect, but customers should be aware of exactly what that action will and will not accomplish.
Updates: Verizon Wireless and U.S. Cellular Corp. have always declined to participate in the proposed cell phone directory, and initial partners Sprint Corp. and Alltel Corp. have since pulled away from the project due to concerns about bad publicity and possible new government regulations. So, as of January 2005, even if the cell phone directory database were compiled as planned, at least 45% of U.S. cell phone numbers wouldn't be included.
Additional information: The Truth About Cell Phones and the National Do Not Call Registry
(Federal Trade Commission)
Wireless 411 Service: Q&A
(Qsent)
Privacy and the Wireless 411 Service
(Qsent)
Last updated: 15 January 2006
The URL for this page is
http://www.snopes.com/politics/business/cell411.asp
Urban Legends Reference Pages © 1995-2006 by Barbara and David P. Mikkelson This material may not be reproduced without permission.
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Sources:
Choi, Candice. "Cell-Phone Telemarketing Rumor Hooks Americans."
Los Angeles Daily News. 10 December 2004.
Dalton Jr., Richard J. "FCC Warns Telemarketers Against Calling Cell Phones."
Contra Costa Times. 20 November 2003.
Davidson, Paul. "Telemarketers Won't Ring Up Cell Phones."
USA Today. 18 April 2005 (p. B4).
Drucker, Jesse. "Phone Directory of Cell Numbers Creates Static."
The Wall Street Journal. 14 January 2005 (p. B1).
Hajewski, Doris. "Cell Phone Directory Won't Be on Autodial."
[Milwaukee] Journal Sentinel. 29 April 2005.
Mayer, Caroline. "Bogus E-Mail Worries Users of Cell Phones."
The Washington Post. 10 December 2004 (p. E1).
Stinnett, Chuck. "Wireless Phone Privacy."
The [Henderson] Gleaner. 14 November 2004.
