FCC to Operators: Adopt Anti-Robocall System by 2019 or Other | News and opinions

FCC President Ajit Pai has a message for mobile operators: help us stop fraudulent automated calls or face possible action from the commission.

On Monday, Pai sent letters to 14 companies – including AT & T, Sprint and Verizon – outlining their efforts to detect phone spoofing, a tactic used by crooks to trick you into answering the phone.

Pai urged operators to quickly adopt an authentication system capable of differentiating legitimate phone calls from spoofed calls. "I call those who are late to catch up," he said in a statement. "If it does not appear that this system is on track to be operational next year, we will take steps to ensure it."

The authentication system that Pai wants is called the "SHAKEN / STIR Framework", a standard developed by the industry. With the structure in place, "calls through interconnected telephone networks would be" signed "as legitimate by the original operators and validated by other operators before reaching consumers", according to the FCC. As a result, consumers could see on their phone by identifying the caller if an incoming call was suspicious or not.

A federal advisory committee has proposed that carriers begin deploying the SHAKEN / STIR framework in 2019. However, the FCC states that not all carriers have a concrete plan in place to adopt the authentication system.

As a result, Pai sent letters to 14 companies asking them to fully commit. His the letters specifically ask when the operators will set up the authentication system and how they will inform consumers when a phone call is spoofed. Pai also wants to know why some carriers, such as Sprint, Charter and Frontier, have not submitted detailed plans for the implementation of the SHAKEN / STIR framework.

He asks the 14 companies to respond before November 19th. "Greater participation will ensure that the system works for consumers, who expect real progress in the fight against malicious spoofing and fraudulent automated calls, "added Pai in his statement.

On Tuesday, the FCC also sent a series of additional e-mails to small network providers, urging them to join the industry's efforts to track down the guilty of these fraudulent automated calls and explain the steps taken to end the fraud. threat. The commission notes that it receives more consumer complaints about unwanted calls than any other subject. YouMail, a company that monitors the problem, estimates that more than 4.2 billion automated calls were received in the United States in August alone.