Home Businesses Respond to Junk Faxes

From the Washington Post

For many home fax machine owners, the junk-fax pandemic has grown into an annoyance equivalent to telemarketing at its worst — before the National Do Not Call Registry struck a blow for privacy and sanity. These dastardly faxed commercials typically break federal law. Like spammers, junk-faxers broadcast the same message to millions of fax machine numbers at once. And more often than not, the faxes promote scams not worth the paper they’re printed on.

Several former junk-fax victims favored outsmarting the faxers. Springfield reader Rob Scott said he’d arrive each morning at his office to piles of junk faxes from a D.C. association. He called the association twice, asking that the faxes stop.

When they didn’t, he says, “I sent an invoice to the executive director for the cost of a toner cartridge — about $64.” The director called a week later asking if he were serious. Scott told her he was. She promised to stop. “We never got another fax from that association,” he says.

Leila Leoncavallo fooled the faxers. Overwhelmed with junk faxes from a Canadian phone number, the Fairfax reader downloaded the standard SIT telephone tones from Junkbusters.com and recorded them at the beginning of her answering-machine message. The three-tone sound is phone code for “this phone’s disconnected.” Computer-generated faxing systems hear the tone and automatically strike the number from the list. After 10 days using the SIT tones tactic, Leoncavallo hadn’t received a single fax. “I’m not sure if it’s the tone or just a coincidence,” she says.

Jennifer Tyler prefers outright revenge. “I like to beat them at their own game, mainly using up expensive toner and paper,” says the Germantown reader. “I work from home and buy my own supplies, so junk-faxers particularly anger me.”

When Tyler receives a junk fax, she takes a piece of black paper, puts it in her fax machine and dials the “fax replies to” number or the transmission fax number on the junk fax. Before transmitting, she tapes the ends of the paper together to make a loop. “Your very dark fax will be sent on an endless loop until someone at the other end realizes what’s happening and interrupts the transmission,” she says. “This may not get you removed from the list but it sure makes you feel a lot better! And I’ve never had a repeat junk fax after I’ve used this trick.”

Fighting technology with technology, several readers swear by devices that route calls, block uninvited calls, detour calls or require incoming calls to key in a code. Steve Kane recommends checking out Command Communications Inc. and Digitone Communications Inc. for tele-guarding products. Digitone’s “PrivacyCall Screener,” for instance, is a sleek, $100 box that blocks certain caller numbers and requires unidentified callers to enter a privacy code to make your phone ring. It eliminates not only junk faxes but also telemarketers, political pollsters, charities, stalkers, creditors — even ex-spouses, according to Digitone’s promotions.

Cabin John reader Fred Mopsik uses “Call Intercept,” a $5-a-month service Verizon offers. Working with caller ID, it prompts unidentified callers to say who they are and alerts the consumer with a distinct ring that he’s got a “Call Intercept” call, plays a recording of the caller identifying himself, and gives options for handling the call. Callers who refuse to identify themselves are disconnected. “The junk faxes never make it past the first step, and the phone doesn’t even ring,” he says.

Alan Trachtenberg e-mailed that if wasting toner and paper is the main offense, “just don’t print the junk faxes.”

How to do that? The North Bethesda public health physician prescribes directing all incoming faxes to your computer via a fax-modem card and fax program. “You use your computer screen to review what you’ve received over your fax-modem,” says Trachtenberg, adding that some fax utilities prevent fax calls from ringing, show on-screen icons for incoming faxes, list faxer numbers, and let you peek at the first page to determine whether to print it.

And the junk faxes? Just say no and delete ‘em. One downside is that to send a fax, you’ll need a fax machine, a printer with a built-in fax, or a scanner to scan documents into a file. “The point is to direct your faxes to electronic storage,” says Trachtenberg, “save or erase most of them, print out the ones you need, and save the trees.”