MMS to email - Hide part of sender number in subject

MMS to email - Hide part of sender number in subject SearchSearch
Author Message
bob richards
New member
Username: Dlow128

Post Number: 2
Registered: 12-2014
Posted on Sunday, December 07, 2014 - 05:54 pm:   

Hello,
We are currently trialling this product but have reached a point where we require a little help from you helpful users to continue

We are receiving SMS and MMS fine without any issues and have now configured the server to forward any MMS received to an email address, which is great.

The issue we are having is that the email contains

From: [SMS:+447123456789] MULTIMEDIA MESSAGE

Message: displays picture

Is there any way to obfuscate part of the sender number when forwarding to email

Ideally it would send an email with from: [SMS:XXXXXXXXX6789] hiding most of the senders number to protect their info and still provide some identifying information

Any help would be much appreaciated
Des - NowSMS Support
Board Administrator
Username: Desosms

Post Number: 5131
Registered: 08-2008
Posted on Monday, December 08, 2014 - 06:53 pm:   

Hi Bob,

The short answer is no.

The phone number is designed to go into either the sender email address or the subject line, depending on the configuration.

For small office environments, the subject line replacement will check the public address book (accessible via the web interface), and use a name instead of a number if it finds a match in the address book.

Perhaps a setting could be added...but I'd like to understand the reasoning a little better before I take this suggestion back to engineering.

--
Des
NowSMS Support
Mr bob
New member
Username: Dlow128

Post Number: 3
Registered: 12-2014
Posted on Tuesday, December 09, 2014 - 08:45 am:   

Hi, thank you for your response.

The initial concept is based on delivery drivers taking pictures as proof of collection.

Once a picture is taken and sent to our server it can be forwarded by email to a back end system which will upload photos to a web server

The system will upload the complete contents of the email to a website

These pages will allows customers to see proof of collection but unfortunately also see the drivers number as it is displayed in the subject which is also posted

The reason to obfuscate instead of remove is we can still run reports based on senders number (how many per driver) etc while still hiding the drivers number to the public

Ultimately we plan to use a system where our employees can take pictures and upload them to a public website and be able to hide part of the sending mobile number

The idea of uploading pictures to our site was based on current websites that allow users to send SMS to a virtual number and display the message on a website while still hiding part of the senders number - I believe it is a textlocal API that is receiving and processing message and hiding part of the senders number with XXXXX only displaying the last 4-5 digits

Thank you again for your input and advice
Des - NowSMS Support
Board Administrator
Username: Desosms

Post Number: 5134
Registered: 08-2008
Posted on Tuesday, December 09, 2014 - 08:56 pm:   

Hi Bob,

That makes sense. When I originally read your message, I did not consider that the email interface might be being used as an API. In that context, I get it, thanks for the explanation.

I discussed this with a member of our engineering team, and they confirmed that adding an INI file setting to stop the number from being inserted into the subject header is a simple matter. We should have an update that includes this by the end of the week. I will update this post with detaIls within a few days.

Just for completeness, I'll mention also that there are APIs for forwarding the MMS content via HTTP. If you are interested, this link is a good starting point: http://www.nowsms.com/2-way-commands-for-sms-and-mms-processing-new-2014-feature s

--
Des
NowSMS Support
Mr bob
New member
Username: Dlow128

Post Number: 4
Registered: 12-2014
Posted on Wednesday, December 10, 2014 - 10:44 pm:   

Hi des,
Thank you for looking into this and helping us out,
Kind regards
Des - NowSMS Support
Board Administrator
Username: Desosms

Post Number: 5138
Registered: 08-2008
Posted on Thursday, December 11, 2014 - 04:43 pm:   

Hi Bob,

There is an updated version of NowSMS at http://www.nowsms.com/download/nowsms20141209.zip

It includes an additional setting described below:

* MMS/SMS to E-Mail: Add specialised configuration parameter to stop the sender phone number from being included in the subject header when forwarding to e-mail. To activate this setting, add EMailSubjectBlockSender=Yes under the [MMSC] section of MMSC.INI.



--
Des
NowSMS Support
Mr bob
New member
Username: Dlow128

Post Number: 5
Registered: 12-2014
Posted on Friday, December 12, 2014 - 06:51 pm:   

Hi Des,
Thank you again for your help and I appreciate the time you have taken to do so

Previously While looking over your documentation we came across the "Advanced INI File Settings" post and thought that a variation of the setting below could result in a possible EmailSubjectPrefixConvert to cheekily use your naming convention:

MSISDNRecipientPrefixConvert=aaaa:bbbb,cccc:ddd
(v2007.11.13+) This configuration parameter supports MMS recipient address conversions based upon the prefix of the recipient phone number. This conversion is applied after the MMSC adds a country code to any recipient phone numbers. To add any conversions, edit MMSC.INI, and under the [MMSC] header, add MSISDNRecipientPrefixConvert=+1234:+2345,+6789:+987 If the MMSC encounters a recipient address that starts with “+1234″, it will replace this part of the recipient address with “+2345″ (e.g., +123456789 becomes +234556789).

With a setting to that effect standard uk mobile prefixes could be configured to show the designated text for example: 07:xx, 077:xxx, 0777:xxxx etc

Our back end can remove the subject all together but then we left with no way to use any sender information

If as you mentioned in your first response it is not possible to show just part of the number when forwarding mms to email (its either all or nothing) then thank you again for the update and your help

Kind regards
Des - NowSMS Support
Board Administrator
Username: Desosms

Post Number: 5148
Registered: 08-2008
Posted on Tuesday, December 16, 2014 - 05:41 pm:   

Hi Bob,

Sorry, but those conversion settings apply to a different usage scenario.

Unfortunately I do think the only effective way of handling this is in your backend processing.

--
Des
NowSMS Support
Mr bob
New member
Username: Dlow128

Post Number: 8
Registered: 12-2014
Posted on Tuesday, December 16, 2014 - 05:45 pm:   

Thank you very much for all your help and advice

Kind regards
Bob
bulksmsclub
New member
Username: Bulksmsclub

Post Number: 1
Registered: 12-2014
Posted on Thursday, December 18, 2014 - 10:47 am:   

It is new for me. I was completely unaware from this. thanks for updating me.