FCC will start kicking voice providers out of its robocall database:
Telecoms slow to adopt anti-robocall measures could soon face stiff punishment in the US. The Federal Communications Commission (FCC) now plans to remove seven voice service providers from its Robocall Mitigation Database for failing to comply with required anti-spam efforts, such as implementing STIR/SHAKEN call authentication to prevent spoofing. The companies have 14 days to "show cause" why they shouldn't be removed. If they don't, all their customers will be blocked from making calls. Effectively, their voice businesses are finished.
The companies include Akabis, Cloud4, Global UC, Horizon Technology, Morse Communications, Sharon Telephone and SW Arkansas. In all cases, the companies failed to share their anti-robocall plans even after the FCC warned them about violations. The FCC noted that STIR/SHAKEN is necessary for any provider with an IP-based network, and those without IP still have to show that they're mitigating illegal robocalls.
The FCC required that all carriers use STIR/SHAKEN by the end of June 2021.
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Arthur T Knackerbracket has processed the following story:
In December 2022, the FCC proposed the biggest fine it has ever issued against a robocalling outfit – $299,997,000. The penalty eclipses the previous record holder – Rising Eagle and JSquared Telecom – by nearly $75 million in 2020. After a lengthy investigation, the Commission decided on Thursday to proceed with the huge fine.
The record-breaking punishment goes to an illegal transnational robocalling operation. The outfit is so big (or so blatantly illegal) that it does not have an official umbrella company. It's more of a network of cooperating businesses that made more than five billion automated calls to over 500 million phone numbers within a three-month period in 2021.
In doing so, the FCC says the organized operation broke multiple federal laws by spoofing more than one million telephone numbers to hide their actual origin and trick people into answering the calls. It also violated numerous other FCC regulations.
[...] The operation has allegedly been around since 2018 and primarily sold consumers vehicle service contracts falsely disguised as auto warranties. Two primary bad actors – Roy M. Cox and Aaron Michael Jones – already hold lifetime bans from running telemarketing businesses after losing a lawsuit brought on them by the FCC and the State of Texas. Business names associated with the illegal enterprise include Sumco Panama, Virtual Telecom, Davis Telecom, Geist Telecom, Fugle Telecom, Tech Direct, Mobi Telecom, and Posting Express.
[...] It's hard to nail down robocallers, but it's at least nice to see the FCC trying to hit them with huge penalties instead of laughable slaps on the wrist.
(Score: 1, Interesting) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday October 05 2022, @02:10PM (5 children)
(Score: 2, Interesting) by inertnet on Wednesday October 05 2022, @08:19PM (4 children)
Just as ridiculous is that we're now getting robocalls from American numbers to Dutch phones. I'd really like to know how to stop this disease from spreading beyond your borders.
(Score: 3, Touché) by HammeredGlass on Wednesday October 05 2022, @09:37PM (3 children)
You really think the numbers represent where those calls are actually originating from??? huh
I've gotten calls which show MY OWN PHONE NUMBER as the caller ID
(Score: 2) by inertnet on Wednesday October 05 2022, @10:11PM (1 child)
They were known robocall numbers. Besides, we don't have robocalls here so they certainly weren't local.
(Score: 1, Flamebait) by HammeredGlass on Thursday October 06 2022, @02:33AM
And robocalls can't be spoofed??
Why are you persisting with this naivety?
(Score: 1, Funny) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday October 06 2022, @05:54PM
Call . . . is coming . . . from . . . INSIDE THE PHONE! GET OUT OF THERE!
(Score: 4, Insightful) by Sjolfr on Wednesday October 05 2022, @09:39PM
This is another area where individual privacy should be the default. If I want advertisements then I can opt-in.
I will say it again: privacy should be the default.