The bad thing about SpoofCards:
Here's the really sucky thing about SpoofCards: When they're used against you,
you don't have any idea that it's a SpoofCard being used against you because
there is nothing additional during the call to clue you in. There's no
recording saying "This call has originated from SPOOF-card dot COM, the
BEST way to pull practical jokes on your friends! For MORE information, PLEASE
feel free to visit our web site at..." Nothing like that happens at all.
Instead, the service is used as a method of harassment and stalking against
people; and after it's used, people have NO idea where the call came from.
I know of two occasions locally where this service was apparently used - once
was with me; and the other was on another ham radio operator named Jerry
Stewart.
In the case of Jerry Stewart, what I heard was this... Jerry was running a
food stand at a local Gainesville Amateur Radio Society "Hamfest" a few years
ago. Someone got him into trouble with the local Health Service, advising that
he had been serving unhealthy foods in some way. He was investigated and
nothing was found to be wrong. The Health Service said that the caller had
identified "herself" as "Susan Tipton", and that the call had her CID. They
said that the voice sounded like a computer generated female voice. The
Sheriff's Office got involved. They investigated Susan. Susan denied having
made the call. No one found anything tangible. The case was dropped. This is
all according to Jeff Capehart. (AGAIN! Jeff Capehart - "purveyor of fine
informational foods.")
So Spoofcards are definitely being used against innocent victims here in
Alachua County.
When Spoofcards are used, people usually never know what just hit them.
As of the middle of 2010, it now appears that Spoofcard is even being offered
as an iPhone app. (sigh) This is just wrong. Eh. Why am I complaining.
That just means that now that it's on an iPhone, it's going to get far more
use. As it gets far more use, it means that it will be abused more. After a
while, it will get so MUCH abuse that eventually the authorities will HAVE to
deal with it. Maybe this is actually a blessing in disguise. But
unfortunately, it's going to have to mean that a lot of innocent people are
going to have to end up harmed, first. And that sucks.
I personally can't believe that such a thing exists, and that our country has
not regulated the use of it, or fined these people, or that they've even so
much as had any kind of a lawsuit against them yet for harms caused to innocent
people. And the REASON for that...I just stated.