Carriers Ignoring FCC on Robocall Blocking Technologies, CU Says
U.S. carriers aren't taking the necessary steps to block unwanted calls to their customers, Consumers Union said in a report Tuesday. CU said phone companies aren't responding to pressure from the FCC to put in place technologies to block robocalls. The FCC in June “made clear that phone companies have the legal authority to offer call blocking tools to their customers, and Chairman Tom Wheeler has urged them to do so,” CU said. “But the top phone companies have resisted offering advanced filtering technology to all of their customers, citing concerns that customers may not receive wanted calls.”
Sign up for a free preview to unlock the rest of this article
Timely, relevant coverage of court proceedings and agency rulings involving tariffs, classification, valuation, origin and antidumping and countervailing duties. Each day, Trade Law Daily subscribers receive a daily headline email, in-depth PDF edition and access to all relevant documents via our trade law source document library and website.
In June, the FCC approved an order and declaratory ruling on implementation of the Telephone Consumers Protection Act on technologies that can block unwanted calls. “For the first time, we clarify that there is no legal reason carriers shouldn’t offer their customers popular robocall-blocking solutions, so that consumers can use market-based approaches to stop unwanted calls,” Wheeler said then.
Phone companies could easily offer filtering technologies to customers, CU said. Third-party companies have developed smartphone apps that block unwanted calls, the group said. Nomorobo, a free robocall blocking service, is available to many consumers with Internet-based service or VoIP. Technologies are also readily available to fight spoofing -- disguising the origin of robocalls on Caller ID, CU said. “This would improve telephone security and call filtering techniques.”
CU said 218 million phone numbers are registered with the FTC’s Do Not Call list, but the number of unwanted calls continues to grow. “In part because of changing technology ... it has become much harder for scammers to be held accountable,” the group said. “Many of the unwanted calls come from overseas robocallers who don’t respect the Do Not Call list and don’t fear getting caught. Moreover, because the registry is designed to protect consumers from unwanted telemarketing calls, consumers may receive legal, but unwanted, robocalls at home from politicians or other groups.” The FCC didn't comment.
Efforts against robocalls should “focus on those bad actors who are willfully and blatantly ignoring the laws,” said Scott Bergmann, vice president-regulatory affairs at CTIA. “As technology continues to evolve, these illegitimate users are updating their offerings to circumvent laws and blocking solutions. Instead of creating a ‘one-size-fits-all’ approach that would not slow bad actors down, it’s vital that communications providers have the flexibility to create new technologies and options to help consumers stop unwanted communications. It’s also important that consumers control who they want to hear from since what could be viewed as a nuisance call by one person would be a welcomed communication by another.” CTIA and members have developed a number of tools, “many for free, so that consumers can stop these robocalls and unwanted communications from ‘blacklisting’ phone numbers to downloading apps,” Bergmann said. More information is on the CTIA website.
“We share consumers’ frustration with unwanted robocalls and continue to work diligently to develop and deploy call-blocking tools to our customers, and stay ahead of those who flaunt the law,” a USTelecom spokeswoman said. “We are actively engaged in ongoing collaboration with government, law enforcement and technology providers to put the bad actors behind these illegal robocalls out of business.”
“For all that phone companies [that] made a great show of wanting to offer these services, the fact is that they cost money to set up and administer properly,” emailed Harold Feld, senior vice president at Public Knowledge. “It's easier for providers to simply not offer the services, even if their customers demand them. Before, carriers could say, ‘Well, the FCC won't let us offer blocking services.’ Then the FCC did let them offer blocking services. So now the excuse is, ‘Well, we might accidentally block some wanted calls.’ The reality is 'We don't want to offer these services unless we can figure out a good way to charge people big bucks for them, otherwise it's not worth our time.’"