Speaker 1: The company that's fighting back against robo calls in a
Speaker 1: hilarious way. What's going on. I'm rich Demiro. This is
Speaker 1: Rich on Tech with me today is Ethan gar He
Speaker 1: runs a company called Robokiller, which has an app that
Speaker 1: can help you avoid robo calls on your cell phone.
Speaker 1: But even better, they will actually fight back against these
Speaker 1: robo calls with something called answer bots. Ethan, Welcome to
Speaker 1: the podcast.
Speaker 2: Hey, thanks for having me.
Speaker 1: So tell me about Robokiller. Tell me about the app.
Speaker 1: How is it different than other apps out there?
Speaker 2: Yeah, so robokiller will block millions of these unwanted, annoying
Speaker 2: telemarketing and scam calls from reaching your phone. But what's
Speaker 2: really awesome about it is not only will it do that,
Speaker 2: but in the background, it'll answer those calls with these
Speaker 2: answer bots, which are robots of our own that are
Speaker 2: really smart. They know how to press one to find
Speaker 2: the humans behind these calls so they can waste their time.
Speaker 2: There are recordings of our own that will have conversations
Speaker 2: with these guys and talk to them sometimes hours on end,
Speaker 2: just wasting their time, which is time that they can't
Speaker 2: spend reaching into your pocket stealing money from you. Stealing
Speaker 2: your identity.
Speaker 1: It's quite hilarious because inside the app, you let users
Speaker 1: see the phone calls that they're getting and the responses
Speaker 1: you made to those with your answer bots, and it's
Speaker 1: all recorded, and you can literally go in and kind
Speaker 1: of normally you'd want to avoid anything to do with
Speaker 1: robo calls, but you're kind of making this fun to
Speaker 1: see that you're wasting their time.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I mean, we definitely want to start with this
Speaker 2: idea that you're we're going to give you that peace
Speaker 2: and quiet, right when when your phone doesn't ring, you
Speaker 2: feel good, Right, that's the problem you're trying to solve.
Speaker 2: When you have robo Killer, we block these calls from
Speaker 2: ringing on your phone. The only thing you're going to
Speaker 2: get is a notification that says, hey, we've blocked this call,
Speaker 2: but silently and in the background, we're answering this call,
Speaker 2: and we're recording the conversation between the answer bot and
Speaker 2: the telemarketer. Then once that call is done, this recording
Speaker 2: is in the app available for you to go listen to.
Speaker 2: So you can go listen to this robot, which you
Speaker 2: may have even created, because we let you create your
Speaker 2: own answer bots or choose from one that we've created.
Speaker 2: You can then go and listen to that conversation and
Speaker 2: hilarious when you hear you know, one of our answer
Speaker 2: bots is a guy who's in a canoe that's sinking
Speaker 2: and he's you know, when you hear the telemarketer trying to,
Speaker 2: you know, sell this guy on something and he's like, hey,
Speaker 2: what do you do about a shark, you know, swimming
Speaker 2: around you. You know, it gets really funny and it's
Speaker 2: amazing how entertaining it can be. But you know, it's
Speaker 2: great to to you know, be able to solve a
Speaker 2: problem and do it in a fun way.
Speaker 1: The app. A lot of people are hesitant to download
Speaker 1: these apps for two reasons. Number one, they cost money. Generally,
Speaker 1: if you're getting a good service, you're probably gonna have
Speaker 1: to pay for it, right, so you're like three bucks
Speaker 1: a month. The second thing is if I sign up,
Speaker 1: am I handing over my phone number and just accepting
Speaker 1: a million calls from these robo callers.
Speaker 2: No, we're definitely in the business of stopping these robo calls,
Speaker 2: not making more come to your phone. There is a fee,
Speaker 2: but we give you a seven day free trial. We
Speaker 2: want people to feel comfortable before they choose their monthly
Speaker 2: or yearly plan. We want people to know that this
Speaker 2: is a service that they're going to get value out of,
Speaker 2: and we're confident they will. And I think the first
Speaker 2: time you get that notification that we've blocked a call
Speaker 2: and then you go and listen to it, there's that moment,
Speaker 2: that aha moment where you go, oh wow, this is
Speaker 2: finally a real solution to this problem.
Speaker 1: All right, let's go over some of the most common
Speaker 1: scam calls coming in. Number one, Rachel from Cardholder Services.
Speaker 1: I feel like I've gotten this one because the best
Speaker 1: part about this is that everyone has a credit card.
Speaker 1: So when they call you, they're like, this is call
Speaker 1: from your credit card. You're like, oh, I need to
Speaker 1: listen to this.
Speaker 2: Yeah. The first thing she says is that there's no
Speaker 2: problem with your account, and you're like, well, why are
Speaker 2: you calling me then? But yeah, this is a really
Speaker 2: old one. In fact, I think I was telling you earlier.
Speaker 2: Rachel from Cardholder Services got replaced with like Heather from
Speaker 2: Cardholder Services and Kristen from Cardholder Services and a whole
Speaker 2: other slew of women from Cardholder Services for a while,
Speaker 2: but Rachel has made her way back and is again
Speaker 2: one of the most popular scams. And I believe it's
Speaker 2: a debt consolidation scam where they're trying to get you
Speaker 2: to combine credit cards. But it's you know, it's a
Speaker 2: relentless one. It's millions and millions of calls. In fact,
Speaker 2: it's probably a significant percentage of the five billion robocalls
Speaker 2: and telemarketing calls that are being made every month.
Speaker 1: Two Americans, All Right, a carpet cleaning company. What's the
Speaker 1: deal on that?
Speaker 2: Yeah, that was a carpet cleaning referral service. We see,
Speaker 2: we see it to this day from what I understand, Uh,
Speaker 2: there's a chance that a carpet cleaner will actually show
Speaker 2: up at your door if you contract through these services.
Speaker 2: But the calls they're making are legal.
Speaker 1: So it's sort of a referral service. But the way
Speaker 1: they're doing it is so it's a legit business really
Speaker 1: because they're probably giving leads to businesses.
Speaker 2: It's probably not a like a legal registered business, but
Speaker 2: it is. But the what they what they're not trying
Speaker 2: to do as far as I know, is get you
Speaker 2: to give them money and then have nothing happen at
Speaker 2: the you know, it's but it's still it's still a scam.
Speaker 2: They're not. You can go contract these services by opening
Speaker 2: up the phone book or looking online and finding your
Speaker 2: you know, much more reputable service.
Speaker 1: The phone book. What's that I use y'all money than
Speaker 1: you know about y'all? All right, Investigation team of IRS.
Speaker 1: This is a scary one because it's the government calling
Speaker 1: you and you'll listen.
Speaker 2: Yeah, and people to this day fall for it, even
Speaker 2: though this you know, it's it's now been going on
Speaker 2: at least five or six years, if not more, and
Speaker 2: the FTC and the FCC and the i r S
Speaker 2: have put out public service announcements trying to get people
Speaker 2: to make sure that they don't fall for this scam.
Speaker 2: Because the I r S will not call you about
Speaker 2: a debt, a debt like this, it's not how they
Speaker 2: do their enforcement. But what's really crazy about that call
Speaker 2: is usually the end of that call is them telling
Speaker 2: you you have to call a phone number. And if
Speaker 2: you think about it, the people who call that phone
Speaker 2: number are self selecting themselves as victims. They are saying,
Speaker 2: I believe that this this robot that called me, that
Speaker 2: told me that if I don't call them back, is
Speaker 2: actually going to send the police to arrest me within
Speaker 2: the hour if I don't call these people back. So
Speaker 2: it's one that's I think it's one of the most
Speaker 2: horrific ones because it's really based on fear. It targets
Speaker 2: the most vulnerable in society, and at the end of
Speaker 2: the day, it steals millions and millions of dollars.
Speaker 1: Health Insurance Enrollment Center, health insurance hot topic.
Speaker 2: Yeah, there's actually a number of health insurance scams. It's
Speaker 2: no matter what area code I look at, it's health
Speaker 2: insurance is almost always in the top five as one
Speaker 2: of the scams. They are targeting people, especially the elderly
Speaker 2: or people who have trouble getting health insurance. A lot
Speaker 2: of younger people are having trouble getting health insurance. They're
Speaker 2: targeting them with these calls because again, they look at
Speaker 2: people these as as you know, they look for vulnerable markets.
Speaker 1: This is a big one. I get a lot of
Speaker 1: emails and calls about the tech support scams out there,
Speaker 1: and the Microsoft Security Department is just one name that
Speaker 1: this goes under. There's probably many others.
Speaker 2: Right, but I assume when you answer that, you're like,
Speaker 2: you know, I'm a tech reporter, right.
Speaker 1: I actually got one of these people on the phone,
Speaker 1: and I wanted to see what they did. So I
Speaker 1: went through the whole flow and I saw how they
Speaker 1: said go to this IP address. I was like, oh,
Speaker 1: because I wanted to know what they were making people.
Speaker 1: Do ya download some software to your computer that lets
Speaker 1: them remotely take access? Yep? And it was very slick,
Speaker 1: I must say. How they did it?
Speaker 2: Yeah, they you know, they really have become experts in
Speaker 2: playing this mind game to get you to go that
Speaker 2: one next step, you know, and if you do this,
Speaker 2: everything's going to be okay. If you do this, everything's
Speaker 2: going to be okay. And your computer, which was working
Speaker 2: fine before you got this call, all of a sudden
Speaker 2: is locked up.
Speaker 1: You know.
Speaker 2: They've put some ransomware and you can't get you know,
Speaker 2: and they're saying, hey, I can fix this for you.
Speaker 2: You just have to, you know, go to Target and
Speaker 2: get me a five hundred dollars gift card or something crazy,
Speaker 2: you know, like they the payment schemes are always strange,
Speaker 2: you know, whether it's with bitcoin or something like this.
Speaker 1: But uh yeah, but yeah, we'll do it. Because I
Speaker 1: just got an email from someone who said her mom
Speaker 1: bought I think it was like eight thousand dollars in
Speaker 1: iTunes gift cards, and they stayed with them on the
Speaker 1: phone to go from store to store because you can't
Speaker 1: clearly buy all those at one store. I just couldn't
Speaker 1: even believe that that was real.
Speaker 2: And I've heard of the irs scam ending with that,
Speaker 2: with you know, someone driving around getting these, you know,
Speaker 2: buying these gift cards, and you'd think someone, you'd think
Speaker 2: someone would say to themselves, the government would not make
Speaker 2: me go to target, right, or you like drive around
Speaker 2: like this.
Speaker 1: Okay, So let's listen to one of these answer bots
Speaker 1: because they are just hilarious. Here's an answer bot calling
Speaker 1: back a robocaller on the Robokiller app.
Speaker 2: Hey, Abby, here's the deal.
Speaker 3: You just call me in a vocal training exercise mode.
Speaker 3: Just hear me like think for like thirty seconds and
Speaker 3: e then that long before.
Speaker 1: Your legend never did.
Speaker 3: At But yeah, can you just like give me your
Speaker 3: honest opinion about what you thought of that?
Speaker 1: Dude?
Speaker 2: Oh no, oh my god, are you watching the television
Speaker 2: right now? Do you see what's happening?
Speaker 1: No, what's going on?
Speaker 2: Oh my god, you got to turn on the news.
Speaker 3: This is awful.
Speaker 2: No, Oh god, I can't even watch this. Oh no, no,
Speaker 2: what the hell's going on? You got to turn on
Speaker 2: the news or something. It must be all over the internet.
Speaker 2: Oh my god, what is it?
Speaker 1: Tell me? You're freaking me out, man. These answer bots
Speaker 1: are hilarious. So you've made it fun to interact with
Speaker 1: these guys. What does this do? What does it prove
Speaker 1: when you call these guys? I mean, it seems like
Speaker 1: you're wasting your time, But is there actually a benefit
Speaker 1: of these answer bots?
Speaker 3: Well?
Speaker 2: Yeah, absolutely. Answer bots are designed to waste scammers time,
Speaker 2: and time is money, if you think about it, whether
Speaker 2: we like it or not, whether they're legitimate, meaning they
Speaker 2: registered or not. These are businesses. They look at this,
Speaker 2: you know, they look at this from a dollars and
Speaker 2: cents perspective. They have costs, which are making these calls labor,
Speaker 2: and they have revenue that's the scam money that they
Speaker 2: bring in. They will do anything to increase their bottom line,
Speaker 2: but at the end of the day, time is the
Speaker 2: one thing that's their most precious commodity they've got. You know,
Speaker 2: they can make millions and millions of robocalls, but they're
Speaker 2: limited by the number of humans who can actually go
Speaker 2: and then fit and finish the scam.
Speaker 1: You know, close to the people forget about this aspect
Speaker 1: because we call them robo calls. We assume they're just
Speaker 1: all robotic and automated, But there is a portion of
Speaker 1: the call where push comes to shove and you have
Speaker 1: to talk to a real person to kind of complete
Speaker 1: that transaction.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I've never heard of a of a scam call
Speaker 2: where it doesn't end with you talking to a human being. Oh,
Speaker 2: it starts with a robocall, because that's the you know,
Speaker 2: that's the top of the funnel. They can make gazillions
Speaker 2: of calls very cheap, and you know, they just have
Speaker 2: to have someone available to answer when when the group.
Speaker 2: Then when a smaller group of of the people who
Speaker 2: got the call, press one or call them back that
Speaker 2: small group. And in some cases, you know, I've seen
Speaker 2: an IRS phone scam where I kept calling them back
Speaker 2: and calling them back, and I realized that it was
Speaker 2: two people. It was two people. They were they weren't
Speaker 2: in the same room, but they were. They were. It
Speaker 2: was two eyes who were making these calls. And I
Speaker 2: realized all I had to do was keep calling them
Speaker 2: back and wasting their time and I could drive them
Speaker 2: crazy at the end of the day, whether it's two
Speaker 2: people or two hundred people in a bullpen, answer bots
Speaker 2: have that same effect. Answer bots can talk to two
Speaker 2: hundred people at a time, and that's two hundred people
Speaker 2: who can't be talking to somebody's elderly grandmother or anybody else. Yes,
Speaker 2: it's hilarious, Yes it's fun, but we ultimately believe that
Speaker 2: this is impacting their bottom line and we hear it
Speaker 2: at the end of the day. We're having a huge
Speaker 2: impact on this. You know, we're disrupting this illegal marketplace
Speaker 2: because our answer bots are really impacting their time. Sixty
Speaker 2: thousand hours of time last month that we wasted of spammers.
Speaker 2: That was sixty thousand hours that they didn't have to
Speaker 2: reach into your pocket and rob you.
Speaker 1: Ethan Gar, thanks so much for joining me. The app
Speaker 1: again is called Robokiller. It's available for iOS and Android.
Speaker 1: Check it out seven day free trial. After that you
Speaker 1: can pay a little monthly fee to have all of
Speaker 1: your calls blocked but or all of your robo calls blocked,
Speaker 1: but more importantly, be entertained this thing. They even have
Speaker 1: an answer bot radio where you can just tune in
Speaker 1: and listen to some of these other calls that they're recording.
Speaker 1: It is crazy, Ethan, thanks so much for joining me.
Speaker 2: Thank you so much. It's been a pleasure. All right.
Speaker 1: If you want to link to Robokiller, you can go
Speaker 1: to my website. It's rich on tech dot tv, or
Speaker 1: just check the show notes. Thanks so much for listening.
Speaker 1: I'm Rich Uniro. I'll talk to you real soon.