Bankaro.com – use your social network to beat the hell out of telemarketing spams
Even though TRAI has launched Do-not-call registry, chances are that your cell phone is still being bombarded by marketers selling credit cards/personal loans and of course, country club packages!
Folks from maxHeap have come up with an innovative solution (called Bankaro) to help you ban these telemarketers :- they want you to use your social network for the same.
What is Bankaro all about?
BanKaro.com does its magic by exploiting the crucial insights below:
- Spam calls are based on extensive user profiling, which is again dependent on the user’s purchasing patterns, credit card usage, employer details, salary details, etc.
- Telemarketing campaigns are generally targetted at blocks of users, and even if 2-3 of every 100 targets respond positively, the cost of reaching out to 100 targets is justified.
The main point of action is to make it economically infeasible for telemarketers to do their “business” by attacking their cost structure.
How does it work?
Ban Karo is designed as a special-purpose social network. Every user receives a set of new telemarketing spam numbers on a periodic basis, via SMS, the website, or browser extensions. These numbers are passed through the user’s circle of trust [connections that (s)he's built up in the network].
The circle of trust, in turn, acts as a social filtering mechanism which ensures that only those numbers which are most likely to call up the user and irritate him/her are on the list.
Where do the numbers come from?
Just like email spam filters, the BanKaro adaptive spam filtering mechanism is effective upwards of 99% of the time. However, some calls do sneak through and disturb the user. So, just as one would check the box in Gmail and “Report Spam”, all the user has to do is pull down the BanKaro menu from the browser extension, type in the number, and “Submit”. The BanKaro system takes care of the rest. Every single number reported has the potential to save thousands of phone calls and hours of wasted time.
BanKaro has been started by couple of guys from IIT Roorkee and KGP; and is currently undergoing limited beta testing.
Do give BanKaro a dekho and share your comments – I am surely gonna use this service to beat the shit out of telemarketers. And you?
Watch their demo video.
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Related posts:
- Will BanKaro go away because of TRAI’s DNC announcement?
- TRAI’s National Do Not Call Registry (NDNC), Telemarketers and the great Indian tele spam Industry
- Yahoo Mail is a Social Network..Will that Help?
- IndiaTimes launches itimes, a social network. May I ask why?
- YouTopia.in, social network platform for brands partners with Nautanki.tv
TRAI can’t get hold of all the call-centers. I am very sure that DNC is going to be a futile exercise. In the US, such DNC’s have been there from 95-96, but it has’nt stopped the ’spamming’.
Great initiative! the UI needs to be a little more intuitive. Guys give the bankaro folks a big cheers!
Hey Animesh, Thanks for the suggestion. We will definitely look into that.
We think the same about TRAI. TRAI is a good initiative from the government but as India is a democratic country, ultimate power lies in the hand of the people. So using BanKaro platform people can come and give spammers a good lesson.
How will they monetize such service?
Awesome idea. I already have a list of numbers stored on my phone that I can give them!
“Every user receives a set of new telemarketing spam numbers on a periodic basis, via SMS, the website, or browser extensions.”
This is too painful. How about setting up a SyncML server instead? Then I can just set up syncing and forget about it. This would also be the easiest way of reporting a new spam number — just add it to the address book!
Hey guys, thanks for the comments.
@Siddhartha: SyncML sounds good. Maybe we can pursue that option once we’re all settled in and rolling.
@Vikas: The monetization model’s pretty simple actually. We project a fairly decent cash flow per customer, enough to churn out good-to-go profits.
BanKaro Gang
try Funambol Server /sync4J . its a opensource syncML Server .
http://www.Funambol.com
HTH
Hi
I have one question.
Assume, I have taken this service. Now I got some 20 numbers in Bangalore region thru SMS. What am I supposed to do with those numbers? Can I ban them on my mobile(so that I don’t receive calls from those numbers). Or I have to add them in phon book, and when such number comes, disconnect it manually?
Br
Gurpreet
Hi Gurpreet,
BanKaro will send you the numbers in vcard format and you can directly save the vcard in your phonebook. And when a spammer calls you, its upto you if you want to receive it or not.
@Prashant: Thanks for the link. It really helped. We’ll keep junta posted on our SyncML initiative.
Am not very tech savy guy, but just wanted to know why does Bankaro portal doesnt support IE , and asks for Firefox, moreover i tried signing mnay times but was not able to do so. There is no feedback option on the site, something very basic but missed by most of the websites.
Hi Mahesh! Thanks for the update; we’ve been very busy over the last few days implementing support for IE.
We had totally forgotten about the feedback option, an admittedly rookie mistake. We apologize, and promise to add the feature asap.
Thanks a lot for your feedback!!
Go Mishra Go !!!!!!!!!!!!!
Awesome!
AM, LM, SJ
great going people
All the best..
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