Robocalls have made life easier for illegal intentions, yet harder for households. These annoyances look just like regular phone calls except that at the other side of the line is a robot who doesn’t listen. Instead, they are repeating the text they’ve been programmed to deliver. This system of prerecorded calls is not safe. Scammers have been taken advantage of this for ages by pretending to call from official institutions and asking for funds. Because of their intrusive nature, FFC wants to banish illegal robocalls for good.
FCC Will Collaborate with Phone Companies to Identifiy Illegal Robocalls
On Thursday, the Federal Communication Commission announced that the authorities are planning a series of rules against illegal robocalls. Through them, the FCC hopes to be able to identify and block phone scams. For this, they need to cooperate with phone companies to target unassigned or illegitimate phone numbers.
According to the Chairman of FCC, Ajit Pai, there are around 2.4 billion artificial calls that contact people each month. He stated that the majority have a fraudulent nature.
“Robo-calls are the No. 1 consumer complaint to the FCC from members of the American public.”
The Public Punishes Corporations as Well if They Force Robocalls on Them
Other reports from FCC show that there is at least 1 in 10 Americans who has been falling victim to such a scam. Companies also had something to lose if they tried to appeal to this marketing channel. For instance, PayPal back in 2015 managed to force some of its users to agree on their new robocall campaign. However, as the organization started to receive large waves of criticism even from lawmakers, PayPal redrew this strategy from the market.
Ajit Pai is more concerned with the illegal robocalls than those coming from corporations and institutions. The practice that bypasses security is the spoofing method. Contacted people see an official phone number calling them when scammers are actually using another number. This way, the origin of the call is deceitful.
Thus, the proposal targets illegal robocalls mostly. The authorities may finish their paper by the end of the year. The public can also play a proactive role and submit their feedback. This way, Americans are one step closer to having a peaceful evening without annoying artificial calls. Telecommunications companies are also on board with this direction, especially Verizon and AT&T.
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