Lenny - the Telemarketers worst nightmare!

[Nezgar]

Do you get a lot of spam/scam/telemarketer calls? If so, I've setup a brand new easy-to-remember Canadian access number for Lenny that I'm letting fellow Public Mobile community members know about to try first! Calls are recorded, and may be shared or posted online. Contact me directly if you'd like a copy of your call. Provide Date/Time, and caller-ID.

+1 (226) 444-SPAM

Introduction:
According to Wikipedia:  "Lenny is a chatbot designed to waste time of telemarketers. The 16 prerecorded messages are described as being spoken in a soft Australian accent. Recordings of conversations with the bot are widely shared online on websites such as Reddit and YouTube."

Check out this YouTube channel to hear many previous calls to Lenny:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5Jik-FdWhWk&list=PLduL71_GKzHHk4hLga0nOGWrXlhl-i_3g

Disclaimer:
- Prank calls to this number are not allowed.
- Lenny is for incoming, telemarketing calls only - not for annoying innocent people.
- The Canadian access number incurs usage costs for me, so please don't abuse it.

There are two ways to direct your calls to Lenny with Public Mobile:

Option 1:
Program your "declined/busy" conditional call forward number by dialing: *67*12264447726# - Now, when you see an incoming junk call, simply "decline" the call and it will be immediately directed to Lenny.

Option 2:
Conference in Lenny: Program one of your speed dials with 12264447726 (ie 7 for "S"PAM), then after you've answered and confirmed there's a live human on the line you can tell them something like "hang on while I get my dad" then start a conference call to Lenny with Speed Dial 7, mute, and listen in!

How it works:

My Canadian access number uses voip.ms SIP trunking over the Internet to an existing implementation at https://toao.net/595-lenny  which only had a USA PSTN access number. Since you can't directly forward to USA numbers with Public Mobile, I setup this (memorable 😁 ) Canadian number for convenience from my Public Mobile phone.

Update 2/22/2022: One of the upstream services I utilize to provide the lenny service has their own page describing Lenny, as well as a public call recording archive for your endless entertainment.

[Nezgar]

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@604Traffic wrote:

I like this idea but I don't get how you hook an INCOMING call to the Rick Astley prerecorded music session..

So if come unknown hacker calls in to my number do I just ''dial' the Rick Astley music & it will play on its own?

It's a great idea to let these callers think they're 'on hold' but I'm just not sure how or WHEN you are supposed to call up the music - simple explanation please.

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To transfer the call AFTER you answer the call would be a little tricky, as you would have to put the incoming call on hold while you setup a 3-way/conference call to Lenny or the Rick Astley hotline, then join the calls and listen in...

The simplest is to redirect calls BEFORE you answer the call. You program a number that calls are directed to when you DECLINE a call instead of answer, and those calls get forwarded to another number of your choosing. (Instead of your voicemail normally).

So, for example to make only calls that you explicitly DECLINE go to the Rick Astley hotline, dial: *67*2263361437#

Calls that you just ignore (let ring 4-6 times) or while your phone is off, will continue to go to voicemail as normal.

To reset the above setting and have declined calls go to voicemail again as before, dial either ##004# or ##67#.

Another target number I've used for the above setting recently is 306-995-7000 which is SaskTel's dial-up Internet number. Yes it is still alive LOL. Maybe a telemarketer/spam call to a modem will blackball my number in their call is answered by a modem screeching to them. 📟🙃

Cheers!

[604Traffic]

I like this idea but I don't get how you hook an INCOMING call to the Rick Astley prerecorded music session..

So if come unknown hacker calls in to my number do I just ''dial' the Rick Astley music & it will play on its own?

It's a great idea to let these callers think they're 'on hold' but I'm just not sure how or WHEN you are supposed to call up the music - simple explanation please.

[AndyL964]

I tested setting it to Busy and declining from my landline and it works. You just can't do it with international numbers or numbers outside Canada anymore even if you have a long-distance add-on since those don't cover Call Forwarding apparently.

@Nezgar ^

[Nezgar]

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@hTideGnow wrote:

HI @AndyL964  this trick might not work now, Conditional fowarding is not working anymore

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This is absolutely correct since Public Mobile enabled VoLTE... 😑

[Nezgar]

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@AndyL964 wrote:

That's what I plan to do, mainly so that my voicemail inbox won't get cluttered up.

I'm guessing that once you build your own hardware to run it on you will be closing down the number? Either way, since there's a working alternative after all I'll use that instead since I don't want to trouble you with additional costs and because all calls I get nowadays are automated anyway. Thanks again for everything!

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Naw, I won't give up that number, but I would like to eventually have the calls routed to a PBX service running on my own hardware instead of relying on pay-per minute services and other peoples setup. it would be cheaper then too since call recording and transcription can be done on my own system as well.

[hTideGnow]

HI @AndyL964  this trick might not work now, Conditional fowarding is not working anymore

[AndyL964]

That's what I plan to do, mainly so that my voicemail inbox won't get cluttered up.

I'm guessing that once you build your own hardware to run it on you will be closing down the number? Either way, since there's a working alternative after all I'll use that instead since I don't want to trouble you with additional costs and because all calls I get nowadays are automated anyway. Thanks again for everything!

[Nezgar]

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@AndyL964 wrote:

Finally, the search is over! The only Canadian prank number I've been able to find was one that played the rock roll song but that wasn't in service anymore. Every other number was based in the United States which doesn't work with Public Mobile's call forwarding service. Thank you so much!

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Remember, Lenny isn't for outgoing "prank" calls, its for telemarketers and scammers to be forwarded to. I pay for the minutes to run it, and have recently had to resort to forwarding to the USA service via PSTN since I lost my good SIP endpoints. Eventually I'll get around to building a box to run it on my own hardware...

Also, regarding a "rock & roll" line, there is still a Canadian "Rick Astley Hotline" at +1 (226) 336-1437 🙂 (Operated by Fongo, not myself!)

[AndyL964]

Finally, the search is over! The only Canadian prank number I've been able to find was one that played the rock roll song but that wasn't in service anymore. Every other number was based in the United States which doesn't work with Public Mobile's call forwarding service. Thank you so much!

[darlicious]

@gpixel 

Yes I do happen to have a working sim card in my camera at the moment but it's the A3 with the $10 plan that has suddenly become the target of spam callers. I think I may have used that number when I signed up for ubereats two weeks ago....I will have to sign into that account and cancel after filing a complaint. Just goes to show how crappy their privacy policy is.....

[gpixel]

@darlicious 

I thought you have a pixel?

why don't you just use screen call? 

[darlicious]

@Nezgar 

Ten spoofed spam calls since 7am this morning. Lenny has been installed a ready to go for the next one.

[Nezgar]

There's a new Canadian Lenny number in town that I recently learned of, not operated by me:

• 437-291-5161 (Toronto, ON, Canada)

As per these pages:

• https://www.reddit.com/r/itslenny/comments/pro0lq/can_we_share_our_lenny_s/

• https://www.reddit.com/r/itslenny/comments/q1l3wr/lenny_has_gone_international_united_kingdom/

Similar rules apply to this number:

• Do not use Lenny on outgoing calls or you will be blocked.
• If you're blocked, you'll only hear music when you try to call Lenny.
• I do not care how much you call and talk to him yourself or use him to answer unsolicited calls.

[hTideGnow]

@Nezgar 

checking the solution on another post. and got referred here.. interesting "fight back" to Telemarkerters.. Thanks

[Nezgar]

I updated the DID today with a new hunt group that will randomly try 1 of 4 public "Lenny" bots accessible via SIP over the Internet so just in case one of them is offline, it will immediately try another. Had a few cases of call failures I suspect due to the single instance I was routing to previously intermittently failing. At least until I build my own Asterisk/FreePBX server to host my own instance! ~~ Cheers!

[Nezgar]

Small change to Lenny's line: I've noticed many of the recent spam/telemarketer calls from CRA or the chinese music one all require pressing "1" to talk to a human. So - shortly after the call answers it now says "This call is being recorded" then sends a "1" DTMF tone to the caller before transferring to Lenny.

Looking forward to hear the results...

[jor123]

Wow, haha. Good job!

[carlaspapa]

This is great I'm going to set it up on my phone I get a few telemarketers that really drives me crazy especially the Chinese lady one get all the time!

[Staliger]

@srlawren Wow, that's interesting! Thanks for letting us know.

[srlawren]

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@Staliger wrote:

You also can add your number to Do-not-call list, and the number of marketing call will decrease.

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@Staliger FYI you're half correct: it will decrease the number of legitimate organizations marketing to you.  Unfortunately, for anyone nefarious, it represents a database of legitimate phone numbers they can concentrate their efforts upon.   

[Nezgar]

@sheytoon There are all kinds of theories... The most interesting "converations" with Lenny would be once you have a live human on the line, not so much for dead-end robocalls.

[sheytoon]

@Nezgar Awesome work on the technical side of things to set this up!

Having said that, while Lenny is great and quite entertaining, using it will increase the amount of telemarketing calls you receive. This is because robodialers will call back numbers who tend to answer calls for longer durations.

Everyone should decide for themselves depending on what their end goal is.

[gpixel]

@Nezgar great job! I'm sure this will work for some people. lately I've been getting local area code calls with a Chinese recording.

[Staliger]

@Nezgar Hahaha! That's awesome, thanks! You also can add your number to Do-not-call list, and the number of marketing call will decrease.

[maximum_gato]

@Nezgar 

LOVE IT!!!!  I bow to the master.......keep up the great work!