Standards for phone number formatting/digit grouping etc

Hi everyone, just to state the obvious I am not in charge of anything here nor am I trying to tell anyone what to do.

However, I do think it would be easier to search, read and otherwise use this forum if we could agree on a more or less standard format for phone numbers.

I would suggest three things:

First, only ASCII characters. A lot of spam postings for scam numbers elsewhere on the internet that get copied here use non-standard characters, “leet-speak” letters in the place of numbers, and other garbage. This shouldn’t be copied and pasted into the reports here.

Second, a standard format, at least for U.S. 10-digit numbers. I would suggest NNN-NNN-NNNN. That way, numbers can be searched effectively.

Third, put the main number (if there is one) in the subject line of the first post in a topic.

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I like the idea of putting the numbers in the subject of the post. However, if I could make a personal request, could we maybe also put the phone number, on a line by itself, in the body of the post?
As a blind person who uses a screen reader to access my computer, having the number on a line by itself would make it the easiest for me to copy/paste it as needed into my dialers.
If people forget it’s not a huge deal, it’s just one of those nice to have wish list items.
Thanks! :slight_smile: You all rock!

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This would be great for the site, adopting a universal standard would make data gathering and extraction much, much easier too. Perhaps we should look into a formatting plugin.

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Might not be a good idea any more, up for debate. Makes it much easier for the posts to be indexed on google search - or whatever it is - and those pesky scammers to find the site/specific post when they try to find out where their number has been posted then they start coming and trying to cause a major nuisance or even if it’s another load that’s been posted on here trying to, for whatever reason, believe they can threaten legal action.

Could be best left just in the post itself rather than both the post and title.

Eh, if its appearing in Google searches, then its warning victims when they look it up. I think pushing to be indexed is the right move.

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Yeah, fair point - exactly what I want to push for, just minus the idiots running the operation finding the post/site and causing issues haha! Oh well.

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