An Allen-based company that developed an app to block robocalls on smartphones has dialed in on a new product that does the same thing on a landline.
The new product called Call Control Home, comes in a black box the size of a Whataburger Jr., and is made by Call Control. The company is headquartered in the Watters’ Creek development in Allen, according to a report by Dave Lieber in The Dallas Morning News.
Lieber said the box connects to a landline phone and captures the latest list of bad phone numbers by syncing to a smartphone via Bluetooth.
He reported that the debut model costs $130 and includes a one-year subscription to the company’s service and its online community. The company’s smartphone app, nomorobo.com, costs $3 a month or $29 for a year’s subscription.
“People call you and say your name. You trust them.”
John Adler
Lieber reported that one of the company’s founders, Ben Sharpe, developed the first call blocker for Blackberry phones.
The company has an online community at sister site, EveryCaller.com, which allows people to post scam numbers and also includes a database of all numbers that have been reported.
Lieber wrote that CEO John Adler’s interest in the app grew from his 89-year-old father being ripped off for $300 by a fake Microsoft tech support scam.
“This is the World War II generation,” Adler told Lieber. “People call you and say your name. You trust them.”
Adler’s father died in 2014.
Adler, who is a former telecom executive, was then motivated to create the call blocker. He sought out Sharpe as an investor, and after teaming up, the Home box was their first big project.
The company plans to unveil the box to the world at next year’s Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas.
[Photo: Screenshot via Call Control video}
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