How do you block the display of your telephone number when you dial an
800 toll free telephone number? [TELECOM Digest Editor's Note: Essentially, in general, you _cannot_ block your number ID, nor name ID when calling an 800 number, nor when calling 911, nor a 1010+ number. That is because when you dial one of those numbers, although the end result is the same, the transport mechanism is different. When your name/number shows up on their 'caller ID' device, it is not 'caller ID', it is something known as 'ANI' (Automatic Number Identification) from which there is no hiding. As I noted above, the end results are the same, however. Whenever the called party is expected to pay for your call, i.e. an 800 number or 911, etc. then the person paying for the call rightfully expects to know _who_ is calling ... there are a few ways to get around this, but their legality is questionable. We discussed one of these methods in this space on Monday in the message on 'Spoofing your Caller ID', for example by using
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but that seems like a tedious method, and the ospenterprises people say they gladly cooperate with authorities on request. Say, you were not thinking about making a lot of hang-up calls to someone's 800 number were you? PAT]