Meet Dr. Herman I. Libshitz, a retired radiologist and potential Verizon customer who would like DSL. Sadly, Dr. Libshitz was informed that he could not use his name in his email address or as his user name because it has “shit” in it.
He tried his best to escalate the complaint with Verizon, but had little luck. First, he called the help line:
“We called their help line, and got a wonderful young man in the Philippines who told us:
” ‘We can’t install it because your name has – in it.’ “
I asked the doctor how I was going to print that. He said, “Just say it’s a word contained in Libshitz.”
He had no luck with a supervisor, so he called the billing disputes number and reached another supervisor who promised to investigate and have someone contact him because ” the only person who could help was in Tampa, and that man would have to call India to get them to change the computer code.” No one called back.
Finally, he got a letter informing him that he could not use his name as a username because it didn’t comply with Verizon’s policy.
It took calls from the Philadelphia Inquirer to get Verizon to deal with Dr. Libshitz and his “questionable” name, and that’s what bothers him. He told the Inquirer that what he wants “is for these people at least to stand at attention to explain themselves. I don’t know if you’ve ever tried to get to Verizon. . . . You cannot get to them. They are insulated from things like this.” Unless you work for a newspaper, that is.
Here’s Verizon’s official response:
“As a general rule (since 2005) Verizon doesn’t allow questionable language in e-mail addresses, but we can, and do, make exceptions based on reasonable requests. The one from Dr. and Mrs. Libshitz certainly is reasonable and we regret the inconvenience and frustration they’ve been caused.”
Daniel Rubin: When your name gets turned against you [Philadelphia Inquirer] (Thanks, Will!)
(Photo: Maulleigh )
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“…frustration they’ve been caused.”? WTF. PR writing may be crafty, but going so far as to awkwardly contort the sentence into the passive voice as opposed to simply saying “…frustration Verizon caused,” or even “…frustration this situation caused” is just silly.
I have used the login SpammersAreScum on various sites. Eventually, I hit one that wouldn’t allow it. Turns out they’re not spam-averse; once I changed the last word the system was happy. Idiots.
@numberoneasa: “Weiner is a German name and it is pronounced WHY-ner.”
No, in proper German it’d be “Vy-ner” — “Why-ner” is just as much an American mangling as “Wee-ner”.
Welcome to Dick Van Dyke’s internet hell.
@xphilter: Having worked in software development(for high-end software), I’m not surprised there is no provision for “exceptions”. Our software wouldn’t accept hyphenated or multiple word last names, but the interface designers let any alphanumeric crap through for the phone numbers. Evey time I pulled a phone number in, my code had to filter for any non numeric characters. It went downhill from there.
Logical thing would be to have the software just pop up a warning on potential vulgar items, and have a person make the call on allowing it.
@Franklin Comes Alive!: That reminds me back when typhoon Longwang hit China. Best part was watching some of the news anchors try to keep straight faces.
A friend of mine was a new employee at a bank. She had a Mr. Lipschitz at her desk when another co-worker called her and said, “Ask him if his lip schitz, what does his as* do?”
It was a wonderful test of her professionalism.
@BeThisWay: Thas funny, I wouldn’t have been able to look at him again without busting out laughing.
why doesnt he open a gmail account and just have dsl without using their email…obviously when he cancels the dsl so will his email.
just creat dr.libshitz@gmail.com
and what can you do, their systems are programmed in way that obscene words cant be used, even spam filters probably would pick up those 4 letters
what if his last name was longdickz? same outcome.
so stop complaining, blame your parents!
Isn’t it a little insecure for identity theft for your email address to contain your real name? Not a major issue, but one less step for a crook to go through.
That is how Verizon lost the bid for the Jersey Fuckawee Tribe broadband.
…I can’t be the only one to have heard that joke.
@CrazyMann: You can get dial-up from anybody with a local number; it doesn’t have to be through your phone company.
Verizon:
Dr. Herman I. Libshitz, we’ve placed an exception for your name in our porn filter.
OK, now I’ll need your billing address to finish setting up your account.
Dr. Herman I. Libshitz:
69 Cumming Strasse
Fucking, Austria
[www.theregister.co.uk]
[www.toytowngermany.com]
[googlesightseeing.com]
Verizon: Ummm… Could you hold please!?!
@xphilter: In the military this very problem has been known as the ‘secretary dilema’. Basically, the idea frequently comes up to prevent classified(SECRET) information from being passed over unsecure systems by searching for terms used to mark classified information. The biggest one is ‘SECRET’. The problem? A dumb filter will hit on the word ‘secretary’, among others.
Of course, I oppose any banning of ‘bad’ words because it simply leads to substitution – there’s still a need for the term the word expresses, so language, if blocked, simply comes up with a new one. Thus the million and a half terms for sexual organs, sexual and excretionary acts, etc…
I’m reminded of an online cartoon where the main character was quite foul-mouthed, but transported to a universe where it’s not allowed(think of him being in a game universe with a G rating). All the common four letter words come out ‘Bleep’. As of the last cartoon he had his soldiers singing dirty limericks with not a four letter word in them that still manages to express quite graphical acts – and it’s allowed because the filter is *dumb*.
@Ragman: I’m afraid the profanity filters got to Dick Van Dyke as well — he’s now known as Penis Van Lesbian. :p
@eelmonger: @JustThatGuy3: Who’s Ivanna Fuckalot? Is that a real person?
I have a similar problem pretty regularly with online services, as my last name is Root, which is a reserved word on Unix-based systems.
there is many other free email address providers. yahoo, gmail, hotmail they have filters also and will not allow any names that gets into the string, so why verizon to blame. use a different user name. dont has to be your first and last name as user name. awsomdoc