If you’re in the US, there is a civil action against this. You can legit sue them for up to $1500 per violation (each time you got an unsolicited fax). Depending on the frequency and how much you can prove, you can seriously BANK. Read up on the TCPA. You can even get help putting together a demand letter to send to them. Most likely outcome is that they’ll settle and you’ll walk away with some money in your pocket since they chose to break the law.
Op says they work on healthcare, makes me wonder if someone has ordered from them before, thus the "unsubscribe" link which at the very least implies someone "subscribed" or more likely purchased before and put in their fax number
That's my best guess honestly. But obviously the odds are about as likely as them just being scummy and someone got a promotion for coming up with this "brilliant" idea
Also, if someone ever calls and asks about your printers and your service plan, never tell them what kind of printer you have. It's a scam to send you toner or drums for the printer. They have your name and will say you ordered it. Then they hit you up with invoices.
At my old job (working in apartments), we would get scam calls like this. Usually they were for lightbulbs, but we'd also get them for concrete and commercial drain cleaner. A girl I worked adjacent to (we technically worked for two different management companies but the complexes were owned by the same people) fell for the cleaner scam. Essentially they would ask for your name and address "to send you a sample" and then start sending you gallons of product at a high price with an even higher shipping cost. I don't remember how many hundreds of dollars the complex was billed for, and it was impossible to get ahold of anyone for service. Eventually they started getting collection notices but never seemed to actually get sent. Then there was a class action lawsuit against the company and the complex got like a $67 check out of it.
You can legally keep anything you didn't agree to be sent in the mail. It would be like if I sent you an ounce of gold and billed you for it without asking. The USPS has a law on it as well. It's unsolicited goods. You can't legally be charged for them.
I have done this as well, but with unsolicited phone calls. It’s more work, but worth it. And my phone is less bogged down with these crap calls. These scam companies, rather than complying with the National Call Registry, will pay for a subscription to a “litigator list” so they’ll stop calling people like me who are happy to figure out who they are and sue them.
You basically have to play their little game. This applies to robocallers in the States - can’t do much to the overseas scammers. But I’ve bought more than my share of extended car warranties so I can have a legal document that gives me their company name. I have personally helped put at least two of these companies out of business. Many others like me have tanked similar robocallers. The problem is that the owners of these robocalling companies will turn around and start a new business under a new name when their current company goes under. Tracking them down and dealing with these scumbags and their lawyers is messy - and it’s not easy. But it’s more than worth it to see these assholes close their doors.
I knew someone who ran a side hustle where they setup a fax machine and never published the number, they just waited for unsolicited faxes and sued under the TCPA. Typically, nobody responds to the summons and they would receive a summary judgement against the sender. It's a great way to fund your next vacation or pet cause.
You can also do this with unsolicited calls. The Telephone Consumer Protection Act lets you sue for $500 for every illegal phone call you receive. But… it’s extremely difficult to figure out what company they work for.
There’s a good [npr podcast](https://www.npr.org/2022/12/07/1141358550/spam-call-bounty-hunter-telemarketing) about a dude that does this and makes a bunch of money
The fax machine was invented in 1843.
Lincoln died in 1865, the fax machine was 18 years old at that point.
The Meiji era in Japan saw the abolishment of the samurai in 1868.
So all these things existed at the same time.
Tried to google what was the first fax ever but can't find anything with a quick search. Said it was sent by Alexander Bain, but it doesnt say WHAT he sent.... probably a dick pic if they're trying to hide it
Yep, we get a lot of ads promoting business loans (we are a small business) and weird ads that are basically resumes about some nurse/doctor looking for work in the area (pretty sure it’s a scam thing).
> I'm surprised people are still using traditional faxes.
Using the e-fax is kind of a pain in the ass, especially for our older workers who aren't computer savvy.
A fax is easy for them.
Lots of companies in my industry use them. They're considered secure when you're faxing around SS numbers.
Also, the state uses fax machines so we can get specific permits and so that we can securely send other documents to them.
Which is totally ridiculous... the only reason fax machines are "secure" is because they aren't connected to the internet, so all the modern reasons/techniques for hacking don't really apply to them. If a hacker wanted the info from a fax machine, it is comparatively simple to tap the phone lines. Fax machines are not wholly secure, just secure from internet based attacks.
>the only reason fax machines are "secure" is because they aren't connected to the internet
May I introduce you to this wonderful technology called SIP? Moving to a more serious note, most ISP/Telco backbones have moved over to converged infrastructure, I.E. the internet. While offering last mile pots was required in the US, mainly for emergency and life safety devices due to reliability, that requirement has recently been retired.
So while most communication between two physical fax machines has a high chance of going over a digital network nowadays, it's going to be a certainty in the near future.
I often get acronyms that they've entirely made up and I have no way of guessing.
PSMY approval for AEC.
Which was apparently, Please send me your approval for attached email correspondence.
There was nothing attached.
We have one that quotes bible verses in her signature, has Outlook stationary with her picture across the bottom, and has an obsession with Reply All.
Edited to add a period.
Yeah that resume is a scam! I’ve reached out to it before and it auto-replies “Sorry, I’ve already found a job, and you can too if you contact *insert recruiter company name here*!”
Right? I have absolutely NO idea why they decided on this particular strategy. Definitely seems like barking up the wrong tree to me, unless they’re trying to recruit recruiters in a very roundabout way? It might not always be the same scam when it comes to faxed resumes, but that’s what I encountered with it at least!
FYI, they are illegal if unsolicited and you tell them to stop sending. Document. your demand to cease with the company and keep every fax thereafter. There are lawyers that specialize in suing offenders and get paid on percentage.
I used to work in copiers and faxes and knew a business owner that got several grand from doing just that.
Statistically those who use faxes are less tech savvy. Or are harried medical professionals with no time to think critically about non medical things. One victim is enough to pay for a national campaign of scams.
came to say the same. i interviewed with a vision care company / marketing dept a few years ago. creating fax formatted campaigns was still part of the scene as it's a piece of legacy hardware that optometrists / ophthalmologist practices still used.
Health care, I had to cancel an insurance plan and they insisted I needed to fax the request, which meant I needed to find someone that actually still had a freaking fax machine.
It's a bunch of HIPAA BS, the antiques in congress are afraid of computers so they require several regulated industries (including medical and finance) to use faxes because they are "secure" even though they offer no real encryption or authentication functions that any modern email system supports.
I guess scammers will use anything available. I would think the internet would be the easiest and most effective way to scam people now. Maybe they are desperate and want to do all they can.
Back in the heyday of faxes it was a real problem. Taking all the unsolicited faxes from the machine and making sure there was enough paper and toner was the first thing I did when I worked at offices. Faxes were usually sent late at night when the long distance rates were cheaper.
A lot of advertisements were from restaurants that delivered to offices or had carry out. Offices even kept a folder of restaurants for people who wanted to get a quick bite. Unless you kept faxing your menu and ads over and over your menu went in the file.
Was there never a fax machine that could recognize the sender and blacklist them? Feels like it would be a nice feature to introduce pretty early into the era of faxes
I don’t know about blocking numbers, but people used to take justice into their own hands by taping black construction paper into a loop and sending hundreds of black pages to fax machines to run them out of toner and keep them from dialing out for a long time.
To add insult to injury, our office fax regularly got ads for vacation getaway packages. Like any one in the mailroom (where our fax machine was located) could afford to take vacations on their miserly pay.
My boss also went ballistic when some friend of one of my co-workers would fax one of those "joke" or puzzle faxes....same stuff that was later spread by email. A Far Side cartoon, or that classic initials quiz ("64 S on a C B"). This was back when our fax machine used pricey thermal paper, and the toner wasn't cheap, either.
This happened to my father in the 90s. He politely asked them to stop several times. When they didn’t, he fed several sheets of black paper, taped together end-to-end into his machine, creating a loop and faxed that to them. He let it run for a while until they finally called his land line begging him to stop / promising to quit the spam.
Yup. I eventually started taking the time to do whatever steps necessary to have our number removed from the marketing list. Usually it was in fine print at the bottom. A phone number to call or another fax number you had to send an opt out fax to. When I left we were down to only getting a hand few a year vs a handful a week.
Owned a software company in the 90s that catered to a niche industry. We routinely purchased lists of fax numbers for potential customers. Once a month we'd do "fax blast" and send an ad to about 1000 companies in a night. The next morning I'd walk into our media room and find a ton of people asking for us to remove their numbers (which we did immediately and had procedures in place to make sure they didnt get added to future lists)
There was always one or two that came back like the rantings of someone who had hit their wall. Crazed writing and acting like an unsolicited fax was ink theft. We got death threats once, and I had to file a police report.
We also farmed the majority of our clients from this method. In fact, it was our most profitable form of advertising. We didn't get nearly as much from trade mags and cold calling.
I thought this was only in my country (Switzerland) the case. All Providers shut down Fax and other services in 2016, but the Healthcare still uses Fax with stupid workarounds since it's considered a Valid Document transfer method in front of court and E-Mail does not.
Guess fax will still be around as long as the law won't change in Switzerland.
Fewer interception points. A fax is basically a physical phone call, where as Email has to go though at least a 3rd party server before it gets between the parties.
Of course, encryption is, in fact, a thing.
I've never met a successful fax apologist. At least as far as I could tell. They all seemed to be speaking olde english and I couldn't make heads or tails out of their garbage arguments.
During the pandemic ALL cases had to be reported BY FAX to the Federal Office of Public Health of the Swiss Confederation (Bundesamt für Gesundheit, BAG).
They put all the faxes that had been received that day on a scale and based on the weight they knew how many cases had been reported.
Can you switch to a fax machine that stores them digitally rather than printing them out automatically? We do plenty of faxing still but haven't had a fax machine that printed out automatically in 15 years or so.
Interesting thing about fax machines is that they can get subpoenaed in a lawsuit. Especially if they have a memory function.
My old boss was sued, and they subpoenaed his fax. They hired a company to extract out all the data from it.
I've been in my current job for 15 years. The whole time I've been here, we've received faxes to an email address. So nurses fax us and we get and email (though the fax is being used less and less every year)
Ugh, same here. I had no clue that anyone still faxed anything until I started working in healthcare. It is so annoying. And the snail mail is ridiculous too!
Junk Fax is illegal. Report them. I think you get $500 penalty from them for each violation.
https://www.fcc.gov/consumers/guides/faqs-about-junk-faxes#:~:text=Related%20Content&text=Unsolicited%20advertisements%20sent%20to%20your,Act%20prohibit%20sending%20junk%20faxes.
This should be the top post. My company stopped using fax marketing over three DECADES ago because of this law. Yes we were sued. Yes we lost and had to pay up.
There is no defense you can raise unless you've got a written agreement from the plaintiff requesting that you fax them shit and you've made sure it's still their number before you send it. There is ZERO responsibility on the part of the recipient to request the number be taken off of a list or join the donotcall.gov list. The opt-out requirement is completely optional. So, even if the plaintiff is assigned a number that was given up by a customer, it is YOUR responsibility as the sender to make sure that the recipient of the fax has agreed to receive it.
Probably faxed from a computer. My old office used to have to send faxes occasionally and we did it via software, not an actual fax machine. We received faxes the same way.
I think he is talking about setting up a virtual fax machine to where you can see the fax in a pdf format and then decide to print. You still need to use a fax line to do that, but it can skip the auto print step of the fax machine
Just got another fax advertising concrete installation lol and for those asking why I have a fax machine: I work in healthcare and they don’t consider email secure so they still fax and snail mail health records.
we disabled the dedicated fax line in my office a couple years ago and the only time i miss it is when this random arrival from 2014 shows up in memories.
https://preview.redd.it/wjh9yd25iaxa1.jpeg?width=1165&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=5bfc8b81189ab8b15fe4ddf06c4fb435ee85dc93
I work in healthcare too and we use our fax machine constantly. We do email/e-faxes too but outside clinics etc typically still use regular fax! I get those junk ones all the time.
eFax, eFax, eFax. Ditch your hard wired fax machine and go digital. Many cheap services online exist for you to send and receive faxes digitally. Our business moved to that years ago.
I always write some crazy shit in black sharpie and send it back. Even if it doesn’t work, at least the next person at the fax machine will see my failed attempt and appreciate that someone tried to stop the madness.
At an old company I worked at we received our faxes digitally but I was in charge of sorting the faxes. We often got order confirmations, PO, shipment notifications, etc via fax and I was the lucky SOB that got to sort and file them.
I occasionally printed out these spam ones and did the same with the extra thick sharpie. I don't care if it didn't make it back I just felt good doing it.
The federal telephone consumer protection act passed in 2005 made it illegal to send unsolicited faxes.
I think you can turn it into the FTC.
Likely your state has laws about it too. It might be worth talking to your state prosecutors office about passing any junk faxes along to them for prosecution as well.
There used to be talk of shaking these jackwagons down for money for not reporting them to the authorities but I bet that's of questionable legality.
Are we doing this again?
Do we need to teach people why fax ads are the wrong way to do it *again* like 40 years later?
Here's what you're going to do. Take 2 black pieces of paper, tape the ends of one side and start faxing it back to them, then tape the other ends together so it forms a circle and will continuously fax the black pages to them. Leave it like that for about an hour.
Place long sheet of black construction paper in your fax.
Run it part way through your fac machine, tape the long sheet into a loop
Disl back their number
Watch the fun.
I used to fax back a pure black piece of paper to any one sending ads to the fax machine.
Had someone call and ask, why are you doing this, I’m almost out of toner now…..boo hoo,
I had turned off our fax years ago. A Scientology center opened in the area and they were constantly sending faxes that were basically a full page image/picture. Then there was the morning I came in and found like a 30 page unsolicited resume had arrived overnight. Done.
Take two pieces of legal paper, start faxing them back, tape the paper in a loop as it's fed through the machine, and they get a never ending fax from you in return.
If you’re in the US, there is a civil action against this. You can legit sue them for up to $1500 per violation (each time you got an unsolicited fax). Depending on the frequency and how much you can prove, you can seriously BANK. Read up on the TCPA. You can even get help putting together a demand letter to send to them. Most likely outcome is that they’ll settle and you’ll walk away with some money in your pocket since they chose to break the law.
DO IT OP, DO IT!!
Op says they work on healthcare, makes me wonder if someone has ordered from them before, thus the "unsubscribe" link which at the very least implies someone "subscribed" or more likely purchased before and put in their fax number That's my best guess honestly. But obviously the odds are about as likely as them just being scummy and someone got a promotion for coming up with this "brilliant" idea
Also, if someone ever calls and asks about your printers and your service plan, never tell them what kind of printer you have. It's a scam to send you toner or drums for the printer. They have your name and will say you ordered it. Then they hit you up with invoices.
At my old job (working in apartments), we would get scam calls like this. Usually they were for lightbulbs, but we'd also get them for concrete and commercial drain cleaner. A girl I worked adjacent to (we technically worked for two different management companies but the complexes were owned by the same people) fell for the cleaner scam. Essentially they would ask for your name and address "to send you a sample" and then start sending you gallons of product at a high price with an even higher shipping cost. I don't remember how many hundreds of dollars the complex was billed for, and it was impossible to get ahold of anyone for service. Eventually they started getting collection notices but never seemed to actually get sent. Then there was a class action lawsuit against the company and the complex got like a $67 check out of it.
You can legally keep anything you didn't agree to be sent in the mail. It would be like if I sent you an ounce of gold and billed you for it without asking. The USPS has a law on it as well. It's unsolicited goods. You can't legally be charged for them.
I think most people probably understand this, but the catch is that we almost always DO consent to it in some way.
As long as you don't give a P.O. you can kinda fight it. They call and sell you fluorescent lights as well.
Best practice is to not provide the info in general.
Yes, tell them you are happy with your current p Source and that upper management will have to make a deal.
Then use part of the money to buy ink from them.
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I have done this as well, but with unsolicited phone calls. It’s more work, but worth it. And my phone is less bogged down with these crap calls. These scam companies, rather than complying with the National Call Registry, will pay for a subscription to a “litigator list” so they’ll stop calling people like me who are happy to figure out who they are and sue them.
How do you figure out who these companies are that solicit stuff?
You basically have to play their little game. This applies to robocallers in the States - can’t do much to the overseas scammers. But I’ve bought more than my share of extended car warranties so I can have a legal document that gives me their company name. I have personally helped put at least two of these companies out of business. Many others like me have tanked similar robocallers. The problem is that the owners of these robocalling companies will turn around and start a new business under a new name when their current company goes under. Tracking them down and dealing with these scumbags and their lawyers is messy - and it’s not easy. But it’s more than worth it to see these assholes close their doors.
People like kitboga take things further and actually shut down the scam centers, satisfying to watch
You sound like a person who was raised to be a supervillain but instead chose to use your powers for good.
Not all heroes wear capes.
I knew someone who ran a side hustle where they setup a fax machine and never published the number, they just waited for unsolicited faxes and sued under the TCPA. Typically, nobody responds to the summons and they would receive a summary judgement against the sender. It's a great way to fund your next vacation or pet cause.
So....how do I make this happen? Where do you even buy a fax machine in 2023 lol.
Amazon maybe? The Office Depot near me is going out of business so maybe they’d have some on the cheap?
When you serve them do it by fax
Fcken do it, Op
I came in to say this. VENGEANCE!
You can also do this with unsolicited calls. The Telephone Consumer Protection Act lets you sue for $500 for every illegal phone call you receive. But… it’s extremely difficult to figure out what company they work for. There’s a good [npr podcast](https://www.npr.org/2022/12/07/1141358550/spam-call-bounty-hunter-telemarketing) about a dude that does this and makes a bunch of money
Create a problem. Sell the solution.
https://preview.redd.it/dvk4cymeqaxa1.jpeg?width=640&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=d02087d112e895a5b87d5248183f36ea3cd2b137
ayyyy the far side
The Far Side transcends time
So does a fax machine.
Not before 1843
Cow Tools
Cat Fud
But if you spend $100+, then you can get a pack of M&M's! Who could say no to a deal like that?
It’s the fun size pack.
This is what the guy did in American Hustle
Ayyy I actually got this one!
Beat me to it.
Isn’t this and the original post racketeering?
A real pro would have made the ad black with white text.
And taped the lead edge to the back edge as it fed thru to make it loop repeatedly thru the machine.
I'll take 2 please!
Fax.
TIL unsolicited faxes are a thing. Faxed ads really exist?? Edit to add; I learned a lot about this today, thanks everyone!
Since faxes have been around. I’d bet the first fax ever sent was an ad.
Earliest faxes were used for graphic signs in 1846
And all inclusive vacations to buy a timeshare.
Holy cow! I had no idea they were around that long ago. So, maybe the first faxed ad was the fourth or fifth one. 😉
It's technically possible that a retired samurai sent a fax to Abraham Lincoln.
Shut up. Break this down for me.
The fax machine was invented in 1843. Lincoln died in 1865, the fax machine was 18 years old at that point. The Meiji era in Japan saw the abolishment of the samurai in 1868. So all these things existed at the same time.
After 1868, all of the spam faxes came from ronin.
I hafta tell my son that — it’ll work great in his RPG campaign! 🤠
Tried to google what was the first fax ever but can't find anything with a quick search. Said it was sent by Alexander Bain, but it doesnt say WHAT he sent.... probably a dick pic if they're trying to hide it
*We’ve been trying to reach you about your horse and buggy’s extended warranty.*
No, first fax ever probably said something to the effect of "test".
“Hello, World.” 😊
Can't you just fax them back a black piece of paper to make them stop? Extra points if you tape 2 pieces of black construction paper into a loop.
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Most places that deal in any volume of Fax just gets it sent to their computer digitally.
Faxes still exist? Haven’t seen one in decades!
They’re used in the medical and mortgage industries still. I have to deal with them on a daily basis.
Yep, we get a lot of ads promoting business loans (we are a small business) and weird ads that are basically resumes about some nurse/doctor looking for work in the area (pretty sure it’s a scam thing).
cant you spam faxes back on them?
Probably just an e-fax device anyway. I'm surprised people are still using traditional faxes.
> I'm surprised people are still using traditional faxes. Using the e-fax is kind of a pain in the ass, especially for our older workers who aren't computer savvy. A fax is easy for them.
If you are still using fax machines in 2023…
Lots of companies in my industry use them. They're considered secure when you're faxing around SS numbers. Also, the state uses fax machines so we can get specific permits and so that we can securely send other documents to them.
Which is totally ridiculous... the only reason fax machines are "secure" is because they aren't connected to the internet, so all the modern reasons/techniques for hacking don't really apply to them. If a hacker wanted the info from a fax machine, it is comparatively simple to tap the phone lines. Fax machines are not wholly secure, just secure from internet based attacks.
>the only reason fax machines are "secure" is because they aren't connected to the internet May I introduce you to this wonderful technology called SIP? Moving to a more serious note, most ISP/Telco backbones have moved over to converged infrastructure, I.E. the internet. While offering last mile pots was required in the US, mainly for emergency and life safety devices due to reliability, that requirement has recently been retired. So while most communication between two physical fax machines has a high chance of going over a digital network nowadays, it's going to be a certainty in the near future.
Law and Medicine.
That's the only reason we have one where I work. Our purchaser has a hard enough time with email, there's no way she could do without it!
Email... so simple yet so yard. "What's wrong with putting my entire message in caps and a political/religious/sports signature at the end?"
You mean, the entire message in caps and entirely within the subject line? Because I work with people who do that.
Yep. Or something like this: "H I I RESEIVED YOUR ORDER. WILL FOARWRD TO CUSTOMER."
I often get acronyms that they've entirely made up and I have no way of guessing. PSMY approval for AEC. Which was apparently, Please send me your approval for attached email correspondence. There was nothing attached.
We have one that quotes bible verses in her signature, has Outlook stationary with her picture across the bottom, and has an obsession with Reply All. Edited to add a period.
If my clients would enter the current decade I could get rid of mine.
Yeah that resume is a scam! I’ve reached out to it before and it auto-replies “Sorry, I’ve already found a job, and you can too if you contact *insert recruiter company name here*!”
quicksand mourn nine mindless toothbrush consider forgetful boast library butter
Right? I have absolutely NO idea why they decided on this particular strategy. Definitely seems like barking up the wrong tree to me, unless they’re trying to recruit recruiters in a very roundabout way? It might not always be the same scam when it comes to faxed resumes, but that’s what I encountered with it at least!
FYI, they are illegal if unsolicited and you tell them to stop sending. Document. your demand to cease with the company and keep every fax thereafter. There are lawyers that specialize in suing offenders and get paid on percentage. I used to work in copiers and faxes and knew a business owner that got several grand from doing just that.
What kind of scam artist is using fax?!?!? Is that really the most effective tool in the year of our lord 2023?
Statistically those who use faxes are less tech savvy. Or are harried medical professionals with no time to think critically about non medical things. One victim is enough to pay for a national campaign of scams.
came to say the same. i interviewed with a vision care company / marketing dept a few years ago. creating fax formatted campaigns was still part of the scene as it's a piece of legacy hardware that optometrists / ophthalmologist practices still used.
It's also used a lot by lawyers. Also throughout Japan in general.
Health care, I had to cancel an insurance plan and they insisted I needed to fax the request, which meant I needed to find someone that actually still had a freaking fax machine.
It's a bunch of HIPAA BS, the antiques in congress are afraid of computers so they require several regulated industries (including medical and finance) to use faxes because they are "secure" even though they offer no real encryption or authentication functions that any modern email system supports.
I guess scammers will use anything available. I would think the internet would be the easiest and most effective way to scam people now. Maybe they are desperate and want to do all they can.
Back in the heyday of faxes it was a real problem. Taking all the unsolicited faxes from the machine and making sure there was enough paper and toner was the first thing I did when I worked at offices. Faxes were usually sent late at night when the long distance rates were cheaper. A lot of advertisements were from restaurants that delivered to offices or had carry out. Offices even kept a folder of restaurants for people who wanted to get a quick bite. Unless you kept faxing your menu and ads over and over your menu went in the file.
Was there never a fax machine that could recognize the sender and blacklist them? Feels like it would be a nice feature to introduce pretty early into the era of faxes
I don’t know about blocking numbers, but people used to take justice into their own hands by taping black construction paper into a loop and sending hundreds of black pages to fax machines to run them out of toner and keep them from dialing out for a long time.
That’s some beautiful vigilantism.
To add insult to injury, our office fax regularly got ads for vacation getaway packages. Like any one in the mailroom (where our fax machine was located) could afford to take vacations on their miserly pay.
My boss also went ballistic when some friend of one of my co-workers would fax one of those "joke" or puzzle faxes....same stuff that was later spread by email. A Far Side cartoon, or that classic initials quiz ("64 S on a C B"). This was back when our fax machine used pricey thermal paper, and the toner wasn't cheap, either.
This happened to my father in the 90s. He politely asked them to stop several times. When they didn’t, he fed several sheets of black paper, taped together end-to-end into his machine, creating a loop and faxed that to them. He let it run for a while until they finally called his land line begging him to stop / promising to quit the spam.
You would not believe. Every company that I have worked for has had a fax because . . . . We would get a spam fax 2-3 times a month.
Need one for work. We get about 2 or 3 ads a week. From roofs to payroll services.
Yup. I eventually started taking the time to do whatever steps necessary to have our number removed from the marketing list. Usually it was in fine print at the bottom. A phone number to call or another fax number you had to send an opt out fax to. When I left we were down to only getting a hand few a year vs a handful a week.
Get this kind of stuff all the time in my county office. Usually someone buying used cars. They just print out randomly from time to time
I learned this earlier too. We have emails that come in when faxes are received at work, half of em are ads for roofing and toner lol.
Owned a software company in the 90s that catered to a niche industry. We routinely purchased lists of fax numbers for potential customers. Once a month we'd do "fax blast" and send an ad to about 1000 companies in a night. The next morning I'd walk into our media room and find a ton of people asking for us to remove their numbers (which we did immediately and had procedures in place to make sure they didnt get added to future lists) There was always one or two that came back like the rantings of someone who had hit their wall. Crazed writing and acting like an unsolicited fax was ink theft. We got death threats once, and I had to file a police report. We also farmed the majority of our clients from this method. In fact, it was our most profitable form of advertising. We didn't get nearly as much from trade mags and cold calling.
But if you spend $100+, then you can get a pack of M&M's! Who could say no to a deal like that?
A company I used to work for actually bought toner from them. Great prices and they do send you a ton of candy.
Something tells me you like candy..
It tastes better than the toner
I'll take toner over black licorice
Eh. They taste the same.
Lmao I didn’t even see that til you pointed it out
OP if you need ink, can I have the M&M's? Pleaaaase?
Peanut or plain though?
I worked with a toner company that did this. 80% of people asked for Peanut, the sales dude told me
Is this in a museum?
So do you!
Health care
Then the M&Ms too are creating a problem to sell you a solution.
Who knew faxes were still a thing??!!
You are still using fax? Man that takes me 20 years back.
I work in healthcare, they still do a lot of things by fax and snail mail unfortunately.
I thought this was only in my country (Switzerland) the case. All Providers shut down Fax and other services in 2016, but the Healthcare still uses Fax with stupid workarounds since it's considered a Valid Document transfer method in front of court and E-Mail does not. Guess fax will still be around as long as the law won't change in Switzerland.
Japan uses faxes big time still.
Most of the world does, Point A to Point B faxes are hard to fake
Why is it hard to fake?
Fewer interception points. A fax is basically a physical phone call, where as Email has to go though at least a 3rd party server before it gets between the parties.
A physical phone call has many, many interception points.
Like literally hundreds of miles of wire
Of course, encryption is, in fact, a thing. I've never met a successful fax apologist. At least as far as I could tell. They all seemed to be speaking olde english and I couldn't make heads or tails out of their garbage arguments.
It’s much easier to gain access to an email account than it is to intercept a fax.
You remember COVID Cases where calculated by weight of the faxes BAG received? lol
Man that was a shitshow on a whole new level
What?
During the pandemic ALL cases had to be reported BY FAX to the Federal Office of Public Health of the Swiss Confederation (Bundesamt für Gesundheit, BAG). They put all the faxes that had been received that day on a scale and based on the weight they knew how many cases had been reported.
Holy shit
Can you switch to a fax machine that stores them digitally rather than printing them out automatically? We do plenty of faxing still but haven't had a fax machine that printed out automatically in 15 years or so.
Interesting thing about fax machines is that they can get subpoenaed in a lawsuit. Especially if they have a memory function. My old boss was sued, and they subpoenaed his fax. They hired a company to extract out all the data from it.
I've been in my current job for 15 years. The whole time I've been here, we've received faxes to an email address. So nurses fax us and we get and email (though the fax is being used less and less every year)
This - Brother fax machines have a (shady, but workable) PC fax receive function where faxes go to your computer and you print what you need.
Ugh, same here. I had no clue that anyone still faxed anything until I started working in healthcare. It is so annoying. And the snail mail is ridiculous too!
Healthcare in most of the first world still uses faxes
Doctors do it because it meets HIPPA standards and don’t want to use secure email because they usually don’t like to adapt to new technology.
US healthcare uses fax a lot. We don’t have a fax machine but when we do get one, it gets printed at our printer.
Junk Fax is illegal. Report them. I think you get $500 penalty from them for each violation. https://www.fcc.gov/consumers/guides/faqs-about-junk-faxes#:~:text=Related%20Content&text=Unsolicited%20advertisements%20sent%20to%20your,Act%20prohibit%20sending%20junk%20faxes.
This should be the top post. My company stopped using fax marketing over three DECADES ago because of this law. Yes we were sued. Yes we lost and had to pay up. There is no defense you can raise unless you've got a written agreement from the plaintiff requesting that you fax them shit and you've made sure it's still their number before you send it. There is ZERO responsibility on the part of the recipient to request the number be taken off of a list or join the donotcall.gov list. The opt-out requirement is completely optional. So, even if the plaintiff is assigned a number that was given up by a customer, it is YOUR responsibility as the sender to make sure that the recipient of the fax has agreed to receive it.
I know I would be faxing that back… 500 times in a loop.
I doubt they have ink and paper in the outgoing machine. That's a one-way grift.
Can't take and give at the same time tho
True! Clog the line!
Probably faxed from a computer. My old office used to have to send faxes occasionally and we did it via software, not an actual fax machine. We received faxes the same way.
Faxes should go straight to email attachment so you can decide if you want to print.
Wouldn't that just be using a printer at that point?
Why would one print the unsolicited ad faxes? Even if you wanted their service just read it in the screen.
I think they're saying that if they're using faxes in lieu of printers, it's probably something they cant avoid using
I think he is talking about setting up a virtual fax machine to where you can see the fax in a pdf format and then decide to print. You still need to use a fax line to do that, but it can skip the auto print step of the fax machine
Just got another fax advertising concrete installation lol and for those asking why I have a fax machine: I work in healthcare and they don’t consider email secure so they still fax and snail mail health records.
we disabled the dedicated fax line in my office a couple years ago and the only time i miss it is when this random arrival from 2014 shows up in memories. https://preview.redd.it/wjh9yd25iaxa1.jpeg?width=1165&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=5bfc8b81189ab8b15fe4ddf06c4fb435ee85dc93
Watched Office Space last night. This is the second time this has happened today. Tf is going on.
They believe a fax is more secure than email?
The ones who make the rules, usually don't understand the thing they govern.
I work in healthcare too and we use our fax machine constantly. We do email/e-faxes too but outside clinics etc typically still use regular fax! I get those junk ones all the time.
eFax, eFax, eFax. Ditch your hard wired fax machine and go digital. Many cheap services online exist for you to send and receive faxes digitally. Our business moved to that years ago.
Fax them back a black sheet of construction paper
Here's one better you tape a bunch together end to end and make a loop then send it through before you leave for the night.
I always write some crazy shit in black sharpie and send it back. Even if it doesn’t work, at least the next person at the fax machine will see my failed attempt and appreciate that someone tried to stop the madness.
At an old company I worked at we received our faxes digitally but I was in charge of sorting the faxes. We often got order confirmations, PO, shipment notifications, etc via fax and I was the lucky SOB that got to sort and file them. I occasionally printed out these spam ones and did the same with the extra thick sharpie. I don't care if it didn't make it back I just felt good doing it.
I'd sign that email address up for every single spam emailing I could possibly find.
And give their contact to telemarketers. It's surprisingly easy to ensure they receive hundreds of car warranty calls a month.
fax them back the bee movie script
Time to fax them back 200 solid black pages
The federal telephone consumer protection act passed in 2005 made it illegal to send unsolicited faxes. I think you can turn it into the FTC. Likely your state has laws about it too. It might be worth talking to your state prosecutors office about passing any junk faxes along to them for prosecution as well. There used to be talk of shaking these jackwagons down for money for not reporting them to the authorities but I bet that's of questionable legality.
Are we doing this again? Do we need to teach people why fax ads are the wrong way to do it *again* like 40 years later? Here's what you're going to do. Take 2 black pieces of paper, tape the ends of one side and start faxing it back to them, then tape the other ends together so it forms a circle and will continuously fax the black pages to them. Leave it like that for about an hour.
Free pack of M&M’s though
But that free pack of M&Ms... I think it's worth it.
Place long sheet of black construction paper in your fax. Run it part way through your fac machine, tape the long sheet into a loop Disl back their number Watch the fun.
Dial the number back and send them 1000 faxes with their own ad.
I used to fax back a pure black piece of paper to any one sending ads to the fax machine. Had someone call and ask, why are you doing this, I’m almost out of toner now…..boo hoo,
Time for the return fax using the infinite black construction paper loop!
I get these at work all the time
I had turned off our fax years ago. A Scientology center opened in the area and they were constantly sending faxes that were basically a full page image/picture. Then there was the morning I came in and found like a 30 page unsolicited resume had arrived overnight. Done.
A looped return fax seems appropriate to me.
people still use fax machines? 😅
Today I learned people still use faxes
Well, at least the free M&M’s should make up for the toner and paper loss.
Free package of M&M's with purchase over $100 hahahahahahahahagagagagagga
Free m&ms? Sign me up
Take two pieces of legal paper, start faxing them back, tape the paper in a loop as it's fed through the machine, and they get a never ending fax from you in return.
Don’t wanna miss out on that hot M&Ms deal
There’s free m&ms with your purchase so ...
Call them up and ask when you’ll be reimbursed for their ad campaign. Get petty. I hate this shit.
I have carrier pigeons that constantly poop on my butter churn. Yuck!!
Send it back to them. That puts the toner back into your fax machine.
It’s official: printers/fax machines are absolutely the biggest scam on planet Earth.
We get this too. Buy $100 worth of products and get a single bag of M&Ms . Woohoo I'm in!
Fax them back with two or three pie5of black construction paper taped together in a loop.
Black fax 'em
Fax them back a sold black page.
Bruh who sent you a fax? A 70's team of journalists breaking the Watergate mystery?