FCC Plans Robocall Scorecard to Grade Phone Companies On Spam Call Blocking

The FCC is proposing (PDF) a public "robocall mitigation scorecard" that would grade phone companies on how well they block illegal spam calls while avoiding false positives on the legitimate ones. "The Scorecard will empower consumers and encourage providers to continue to combat illegal robocalls by providing the public with an assessment of the effectiveness of voice service providers' efforts to protect consumers from illegal robocalls," the FCC Consumer and Governmental Affairs Bureau said in a public notice. Ars Technica reports: The scorecards could include call-blocking statistics along with data on customer complaints and enforcement actions. The FCC said scorecards could grade providers on a number scale, with letter grades, or by classifying providers as low risk, medium risk, or high risk. The proposed tool would rate wireless, wireline, and VoIP providers on efforts to block robocalls and their "actual results in protecting [consumers] from illegal robocalls," the FCC said. "In practice, that means moving beyond a simple administrative checklist (i.e., did the provider file the right paperwork, did they offer the right tools) and toward a composite set of metrics that reflects both operational practices and measurable outcomes, including how often legitimate calls are blocked."

Whether the tool is useful for consumers will depend on how it's designed, how easy each provider's scorecard is to find, and what data sources it relies on. The proposed scorecard would apply to domestic voice service providers with retail customers, but not telcos that operate solely as wholesale or intermediate providers. "Combatting the scourge of illegal robocalls remains the FCC's top consumer protection priority... As proposed in today's public notice, the FCC aims to develop a scorecard that will give consumers more information about the measures providers are taking to fight illegal robocalls, and it will also incentivize providers to improve their efforts," FCC Chairman Brendan Carr said in a press release.

Something useful

[Anonymous Coward]

Keep it quiet everyone there's something useful that they forgot to cancel from the Biden administration

Re:

[ambrandt12]

Well, this would only work if the phone provider actually does block stuff and keeps a record to look back on, and enforces it.
Wasn't there a thing a while ago to block robo-calls? Isn't that what the DoNotCall list is for?
I would say... "How does whoever get my number?", but that's covered by the ToS/EULA language... read through all of both some day... you'd be shocked at the s**t in there.

Re:

[saloomy]

These are all half measures. The FCC should just pass a rule that every call must carry its 10 digit account id as the phone number. End. Of. Story. Even international calls should have to carry their customer's account number, or if it is a business, one of THAT BUSINESSES' phone numbers. That way, you can "Know your caller". If they land a call that doesn't have the right info, the originating carrier should be fined, then have a timeout on placing calls, and let them explain it to their carriers.

Re:

[ambrandt12]

I totally agree... whether it's the phone number or account ID or some uniquely identifiable data hard-coded into the call., with a way to report these violations of the DNCall list.
When it gets around election time, the amount of junk robocalls goes way up... that'd be a good way to fund the FCC, and the Do Not Call list should be an absolute, not just a suggestion.

Re:

[logjon]

They're gonna take bribes for scores.

Re:

[Valgrus Thunderaxe]

The no-call registry came about under the Bush administration, from congress.

Re:

[sziring]

Would be awesome if they didn't allow these interconnect bot farms from elsewhere to connect on the cheap. What to stop medicare waste blah blah blah, stop having AI bot farms spam call me from "unused local numbers". It must make money otherwise they won't do it.

That horse left the barn long ago

[olsmeister]

Better late than never, I suppose. But people have, out of necessity, devised their own solution - simply never answer your phone unless it's a call from someone you know or unless it's a call you recognize and were expecting. Otherwise, enjoy voicemail, unasked-for caller.

Text messages are in the same spot now.

I'm not sure whether they truly 'cannot' stop the flood of robocalls, or whether they just are too cheap or lazy, but by not dealing with it they've made their service less valuable to most consu

Re:

[Retired Chemist]

Yes. I get two to three a day. That is annoying even if I do not answer. Worse, I might actually miss an important call. The phone companies have to know who these people are, they are making thousands of calls every day. Hardly any legitimate business does that anymore.

Re:

[ambrandt12]

The DoNotCall website has been around for a couple decades. Notice how well it works these days.
Political texts and calls happen even if you do the whole DoNotCall list thing. You can thank your phone provider and Voter registration and every single website you've entered any little bit of information into.
I wish you the best of luck trying to block every single call/text/email you didn't sign up for.

Re:

[Dagmar d'Surreal]

The SMS spam is largely being done by an outfit called Winred, and you can guess what their political affiliation is and why they consider themselves exempt from the legislation. It's going to be a couple of years before that changes.

The Do Not Call database actually works, but the spam callers are almost exclusively criminal enterprises calling for the purposes of fraud, so... you can guess how much they care about the law.

Re:

[spitzak]

I get plenty of spam SMS from blue organizations. This is actually one area where "both sides!!!!" argument applies.

Re:

[FictionPimp]

I found a workable solution for me. I filter all unknown sendors so I simply never see SMS spam. I have all phone calls that are not in my contact list answered by AI which results in 99.9% of them never reaching me. Android phones and iPhones can do this natively, but I take it step further.

I use a service I conditionally forward calls to that handles this. In addition it allows me to generate a new phone number for every business contact I interact with. So if one sells my number I can simple delete my nu

Customer services

[Travco]

These are my favorites. They're an actual AI. That you can manipulate.

The one that's been calling me tells me I've got Humpty thousand in credit card debt and that it's willing to help me straighten it out.
Oddly it cannot tell me who my credit card is with or how it knows how much I have in debt (that I don't)

It's hilarious - tell it you don't like whatever name it's called you by and and you want to be Mister bozo t. clown and they will call you Mister Bozo T clown.

There's at least one YouTube video with somebody who's trying to break the AI by having it do ridiculous stuff although I don't think he ever actually manages to in the video.

Re:

[NotRobot]

Posted to undo an accidental mod. Tried to give you +1 funny but blew it, sorry.

Phone provider labels calls

[NotEmmanuelGoldstein]

A do-not-call blacklist isn't working because many it allows many exceptions. A 'white-list' of names, such as the names of registered corporations, is far more useful.

If a phone number makes many calls and isn't linked to a business name or registered corporation, my phone provider labels the incoming call, "suspected scam".

Designed to be useful

[gkelley]

I'm guessing you'll need to navigate, at a minimum, at least 7 levels to get to the first useful screen.

Laughable....

[Ritz_Just_Ritz]

There clearly isn't any financial incentive (or disincentive) to do jack shit about the problem. The carriers would rather collect the fees than deal with it. Turn up the heat. Nobody at the top gives a crap about how much of a nuisance this is.

The Do Not Call List was useless sooooo...

[Slashythenkilly]

We're going to make consumers feel "better" by rating their carriers who cannot or will not do anything about this invasion into your lives, syealing billions, and getting away with it. Thanks FCC...no really because crime does pay as long as you dont use a gun.

What a joke!

[Narcocide]

Seriously, this one gave me a chuckle: Combatting the scourge of illegal robocalls remains the FCC's top consumer protection priority... - Yea, right!

I also found this amusing: ...but not telcos that operate solely as wholesale or intermediate providers. - So, in other words, they're not even going to bother grading the ones actually doing this.

I give this plan 1 star.

How About Political Texts??

[LondoMollari]

I am getting far more political texts now than ever before. And these politicians carved an exemption for themselves in the telecommunications spam laws. It's time for that to end, but you will find that suddenly the parties are unified on not helping the citizens. Democrats, socialists, republicans, etc. all want to bomb your inbox like it's 1945, especially before elections, and will band together to keep the text train rolling.

My only question is the libertarians - would they stand up and say enough is enough?

How I respond...

[david.emery]

I've found that responding to political text message spam with "FUCK OFF!" will get "you have been removed from thiis list" response. And even if it doesn't work, it makes me feel better that I have expressed my opinion.

That's odd.

[Dagmar d'Surreal]

The last time I checked it was the FCC's job to stop them. I may have to lower their grade from a 'D' to an 'F' if they continue to only ban the companies once or twice a year for taking these calls for money.

Self Help

[fortfive]

The FCC should regulate this stuff. But until they are successful, hereâ(TM)s my tips on getting off the lists (may only apply to humans).

1. When I was younger, Iâ(TM)d talk dirty. If they are male (like me), iâ(TM)d ask what they were wearing. Their responses were often hilarious and/or delivered in native language. Best English response: âoea uniform!â He hung up before I could say, âoeso hot!â

1.5 Sometimes I run the reverse on them. I just start ratlling off about I ha

This does not help the problem

[CEC-P]

So the criminals know which companies are shady and legit customers don't use the shady ones, losing them money, making them charge more for a "don't ask questions" business model for more criminals. Great idea. How about they find ones hosting robocalls and fine them out of existence.