Whoscall
Caller ID App
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Whoscall is a mobile application that offers caller identification services developed by Gogolook Co., Ltd., a listed company in Taiwan.
| Whoscall | |
|---|---|
| Developers | Gogolook Co., Ltd. |
| Initial release | August 2010 |
| Operating system | Android, Windows Phone, iOS |
| Available in | English, Traditional Chinese, Japanese, Korean, Indonesian, Malay, Thai, Vietnamese, Portuguese, Hindi |
| Type | Caller ID, Telephone Directory, Spam Filtering, Fraud Protection |
| License | Proprietary |
| Website | whoscall |
| Headquarters | Taipei, Taiwan |
|---|---|
| Country of origin | Taiwan |
| Founder(s) | Jeff Kuo, Jackie Chang, Reiny Song |
| URL | https://gogolook.com/en |
| Launched | 24 July 2010 |
History
Originally a part-time project by Jeff Kuo, Jackie Chang, and Reiny Song, the trio co-founded Gogolook with the goal of developing a caller identification system to prevent fraud.[1] In August 2010, the first version of Whoscall was released on Google Play in several countries and attracted voluntary downloads.[2]
In April 2014, concerns regarding Whoscall's privacy issues rose to the forefront of national attention as public figures took to the press and expressed their concerns with public records including home telephone numbers and addresses showing up on incoming calling screens. Gogolook released a statement declaring that they had never collected nor stored any personal information on their servers, let alone made them publicly available.[3] It was subsequently discovered that the personal information of the aforementioned public figures was leaked from government servers with poor security protocols that made the information available on search engines, from which Gogolook sources some of their information.[4]
In 2020, Gogolook, the developer of Whoscall, established its overseas office in Fukuoka, Japan.
In 2021, Whoscall launched "Smart SMS Assistant" feature.[5] In 2022, Whoscall launched the "Whoscall Premium Group Sell" on momo shopping online.[6]
In 2022, Whoscall collaborated with the Web3 community "Global Citizen Club" to create customized NFTs.[7]
Business model
Investors
- In 2013, Gogolook received an investment of $11.7 million from Naver Corporation, LINE’s parent company.[8]
- In 2020, Gogolook received investment from WIN Semiconductors Corp., the largest GaAs semiconductor foundry in the world.[9]
- In 2022, Whoscall's parent company, Gogolook, applied for IPO listing on the Innovation Board.[10]
- In 2023, Gogolook went public on the Taiwan Innovation Board (TIB) of the Taiwan Stock Exchange (TWSE).
Strategic partners
Whoscall is also the strategic partner of several governmental agencies in their anti-fraud efforts.
| Year | Type | Country | Name | Goal |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2016 | Memorandum of understanding |  Taiwan |
National Police Agency | Strengthen its anti-fraud efforts |
| 2017 |  South Korea |
Financial Supervisory Service | Anti-fraud technical exchange | |
| Korean National Police Agency | ||||
| 2020 | Partnership |  Japan |
 Fukuoka City Government |
Joint anti-fraud efforts[11] |
| 2021 |  Thailand |
Royal Thai Police | [12] | |
| 2022 | True Corp | Expand anti-fraud business[13] | ||
| Thailand Post | Prevent fraud[14] | |||
| Cross-border cooperation |  Malaysia |
 Government of Selangor |
Expand the Southeast Asian market[15][16] | |
| 2023 | Memorandum of understanding | Royal Malaysian Police | Fraud prevention cooperation[17][18] | |
| 2025 |  Philippines |
Rizal Commercial Banking Corporation | Protection from online banking scamming[19] |
Other anti-fraud efforts
In 2020, Whoscall released the world’s first COVID-19 Scam White Paper. The release was covered by several media outlets.[20]
Since 2020, Whoscall have been releasing Annual Reports focusing on latest fraud trends, scenarios and industry insights.[21][22][23][24]
In 2022, Gogolook released the “Business Impersonation Report” with the Criminal Investigation Bureau.[25]
Awards and recognition
In 2017, Whoscall was chosen by Google as a successful case study on the event Google I/O 2017.[26] In 2021, Whoscall was listed as one of the anti-fraud apps recommended by the Royal Thai Police.[27]
| Year | Organisation | Award name | Reference |
|---|---|---|---|
| 2013 | Google Play Taiwan | 2013 Innovation Awards | [28] |
| Google Play | Best Apps of the Year | [29] | |
| 2015 | App Store | Best Apps of 2015 | [28] |
| 2016 | Google Play | Most Popular App | |
| 2020 | Ministry of Economic Affairs | 4th Presidential Innovation Award | [30][31] |