Prank Call

THE CASE:
You're sound asleep on a weekend night and enjoying your first chance in days to get a good night's sleep, then the shrill ringing of the phone wakes you up in a panic. Still shaken, you put the receiver to your ear, only to discover the call was a prank. Angrily, you slam down the phone and try to go back to sleep while you tell yourself that you'll find a way to stop prank callers from harassing you again.

A prank call, also known as a crank call, is a form of practical joke committed over the telephone. As with all practical jokes, prank calls are generally done for humorous effect. Prank phone calls began to gain an America-wide following over a period of many years, as they gradually became a staple of the obscure and amusing cassette tapes traded amongst musicians, sound engineers.

Legality
Prank calls range from annoying hang-ups to false calls to emergency services or bomb threats. Prank calls that waste the time of emergency services are a criminal offense in most countries and is considered telephone harassment in the US. In the United States, the Telecommunications Act of 1996 makes some prank calls a felony with penalties of up to two years in prison, and possible fines (depending on severity). However, such penalties are rarely carried out. Moreover, to make a prank call that falls afoul of the Telecommunications Act, 47 U.S.C. the call must be done with the intent to "annoy, abuse, threaten, or harass". If the intent of the call is to amuse, confuse, or simply to engage the call's recipient, it would be possible to argue there is no violation of the Telecommunications Act

How to stop prank callers has been an ongoing battle in telecommunications for quit some time. Now that cell phone have become so predominant it can also come in the form of text and media messages too expanding the ways those annoying hoodlums and unscrupulous marketers can harass you at 4AM in the morning when you just want to sleep! There are some things you should know about prank callers that you should know however that might give you the edge against them.

1. Prank Calls are not Legal!

It may be that a few idiot teenagers with nothing better to do with their time are not worth getting angry about but all the same what they are doing is illegal! If this prank calling becomes more than just idiocy and borders on harassment and even threats then you are well within your rights to contact the law to bring and end to it and even press charges against them as these actions are morally and legally WRONG!

2. You can Track Prank Callers

There is a catch involving the law in these matters however. You usually must have some evidence and names for the police to contact and investigate but going through the phone companies to get the details of who called you last can be tedious and sometimes they may even refuse to release those details! Finding out how to stop prank callers might end here except that there is another option open to you that has helped many people get their peace and quiet back and this is to use a reverse phone lookup.