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Senate Passes Bill Cracking Down On Robocalls (cnn.com) 121

The Senate on Thursday passed a bill that aims to crack down on unwanted robocalls. "The legislation would impose stiffer fines of as much as $10,000 per call on robocallers who knowingly flout the rules on calls and would increase the statute of limitations to three years, up from one year," reports CNN. "It also instructs the Federal Communications Commission to develop further regulations that could shield consumers from unwanted calls." From the report: The legislation would accelerate the rollout of so-called "call authentication" technologies the industry is currently developing, which could cut down on the number of calls coming from unverified numbers. Proponents say the new industry standards -- known as SHAKEN/STIR -- could increase phone users' confidence in their caller ID. The protocols are designed to authenticate callers who are using their rightful phone numbers and to eliminate calls from spammers who are using phone numbers they don't rightfully own.

The legislation passed the Senate 97-1, with Republican Sen. Rand Paul of Kentucky casting the lone dissenting vote. The legislation must still pass the House and be signed by President Donald Trump. Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer urged House lawmakers to vote on the bill immediately. The legislation's passage follows a move by the FCC last week to clarify that phone companies may legally block unwanted robocalls and can even apply the technologies to their customers' accounts by default. But lawmakers want the FCC to do more.

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Senate Passes Bill Cracking Down On Robocalls

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  • Gee. (Score:1, Insightful)

    by Anonymous Coward

    "with Republican Sen. Rand Paul of Kentucky casting the lone dissenting vote"

    You mean the anti-vaxxer guy is also a weirdo about regular things too? Chocking.

  • by Anonymous Coward on Thursday May 23, 2019 @08:50PM (#58645348)

    "who knowingly flout the rules on calls"
    Bullshit. That's going to allow them to claim they didn't know, make some "new" subsidiary which is just a new sticker on the backroom door with the server in it, claim they didn't know, make some "new" subsidiary which is just a new sticker on the backroom door with the server in it, claim they didn't know..... and so on and so forth.

    Senate gutted the bill for the sake of robocallers and called it a victory for their victims.

  • I'd just like a way to forward a spam phone call to a central site with one click or drag, e.g., answer/send-to-voicemail/forward-to-spam-clearinghouse. Does Android or iOS offer this?

    • by Anonymous Coward

      Huawei phones can forward ALL your calls to a central site without you even needing to click once. e.g., answer/send-to-3rd-party-db/phone-home-to-Shenzhen. It's not only a feature, it's an uninstallable feature!

  • by Anonymous Coward

    Impetus for this are the people who are so sick and tired of robocalls that they ignore calls from unrecognized number. Meaning cold fundraising calls every politician make are going unanswered. Why aren't the Koch brothers fighting this. Less little people's money means politicians are more beholden to whales like them. Little people meaning the upper middle class who can contribute $1000 to $5000 for their politician.

    • This was going to win in the Senate regardless of lobbying - why waste the resources there when the vote in the House can be bought for so much less?

    • Wouldn't this also work to the politicians favor? It essentially walls off an out-of-band avenue for information dissemination. Coral all the people to centralized places of information where the messaging can be more easily controlled...

  • by Anonymous Coward

    Make them pay it to the victims.

    And what's this shit?
    The legislation would accelerate the rollout of so-called "call authentication" technologies the industry is currently developing

    How bogus can they be? Don't answer that... They already have tech to bill the right number. Make them open it up for the rest of us.

    We can make this happen with enough demand and good voting, but I guess it's just easier to believe their bullshit and bitch about it between elections

    • > They already have tech to bill the right number

      No, the recipient doesn't bill the caller. The recipients DID provider doesn't bill the caller. The outgoing transit provider in Whateveristan bills a person (not a phone number). The company billing the caller for outgoing calls doesn't know which DIDs (incoming call numbers) that the person purchased from aome other company.

      Take my phone system for example. I have outgoing call service from my office from one company, and wireless ("cell") phone service

    • And what's this shit?
      The legislation would accelerate the rollout of so-called "call authentication" technologies the industry is currently developing

      The technology is called STIR/SHAKEN.

    • Here [congress.gov] is the bill. It explains (in their term) what you are asking for.

      I don't understand why any write up doesn't give a direct link to the source. It is unacceptable.

  • by SuperKendall ( 25149 ) on Thursday May 23, 2019 @09:01PM (#58645382)

    This bill passing the senate and House with real bi-partisan support illuminates exactly why I favor different parties in control of the House and Senate (don't care which one controls what).

    It's the best scenario because stuff that comes from the fringes of either side can't really get passed. Whereas you see here with the call spam bill, when something is actually important parties can still act in unison without hesitation. Well, ok, without endless hesitation...

    A divided house/senate prevents a lot of garbage legislation being passed. That's exactly why I supported a number of Democrats running for the House in the last election (both with donations and voting, although donating to either party this days triggers its own wave of identical sounding fear-spam hitting you up for more donations).

  • by hey! ( 33014 ) on Thursday May 23, 2019 @09:02PM (#58645384) Homepage Journal

    The $10,000 fine goes to the recipient of the call.

    • The $10,000 fine goes to the recipient of the call.

      Your ideas intrigue me, and I wish to subscribe to your newsletter.
      I think any politician who got your idea enacted into law would get reelected in a landslide... Yes, even him.

    • by mark-t ( 151149 )

      Who would they fine, exactly?

      It's a fairly safe bet that by the time this bill starts getting enforced, spammers will have started calling from places outside the jurisdiction of this bill.

  • by Anonymous Coward

    Isn't the current fine $40,000. So "stiffer fines" means lowering it to $10,000?

  • One Addendum (Score:5, Insightful)

    by DeAxes ( 522822 ) on Thursday May 23, 2019 @09:23PM (#58645444)

    I would add one addendum to the bill, that the phone companies have to pay if the scammer can't be found. It will incentive them to crack down.
    Seriously, can't they just monitor which network interconnect it's coming from and start shutting down that network? If the VoIP service that is being used for these scammers is squeezed, then they will crackdown on their users.

  • Nice idea but .. (Score:5, Interesting)

    by Anonymous Coward on Thursday May 23, 2019 @09:31PM (#58645466)

    There are completely valid reasons why the caller ID (technically name and number), SHOULD be different. Simple example is an inbound call ACD queue with virtual extensions. Calls come in and ring agents that could be logged in from a normal phone, so you want the origin caller ID information.

    Another example is where you don't want the trunk informaiton either for technical reasons or it simply isn't helpful. Analog trunks for example.

    This SMELLS like a solution from Google/Microsoft/IBM "AI", looking for a problem. Phone companies are well aware of who their telemarking / spam customers are.. They are the ones making thousands of calls under a few seconds in length. There's no reason to register for yet another service.

    • by Skapare ( 16644 )

      i am sure the technology will have a way to make exceptions. then all that is needed is for these exception to be supported by law, such as law enforcement investigators. the telcos already know about this (i used to be the Linux server sysadmin for a small independent one ... their president still active in my LinkedIn contacts).

  • by Streetlight ( 1102081 ) on Thursday May 23, 2019 @09:57PM (#58645522) Journal
    I suggest that all voice telecommunication companies (traditional land line/VOIP/cell phone providers/etc. be fined $1.00 for each robocall received by their customers because they delivered the offending call. Of course, all the voice telecom companies would go bankrupt in a few hours.
  • The legislation needs to go after those entities who pay the robocall call-centers to make the calls. Follow the money.
  • So the government is going to fix something. I will believe it when I see it work.

    Just my 2 cents ;)
  • I can't find a statement by Paul on why he voted against this, but it's pretty easy to guess: "Regulations! Bad!"

    Something like this illustrates pretty well just how problematic that kind of simplistic thinking can be. Of course, in reality this is just him trying to shore up his cred on a vote that doasn't matter.
    • by Anonymous Coward

      As is usual for new media reporting on laws, they do a piss poor job on pointing out some of the downsides. The law broadens the TCPA which increases the liability exposure without doing anything to limit that exposure growth for individuals or groups that aren't engaging in what would commonly be known as robocalls.

      https://www.natlawreview.com/a... [natlawreview.com]

      Encouraging federal agencies to step up enforcement of the TCPA without a clear definition of robocalls causes dire First Amendment concerns and will only serve to place pressure on the FCC to broaden, rather than narrow, the statute as part of its pending public notice proceeding.

  • The wording of what will be accomplished by this latest bill sounds very similar to how the CAN-SPAM Act of 2003 [wikipedia.org] was promoted. Even AT&T which claims to be an expert in all things Internet has selected to violate the law three time by ignoring my opt-out responses to AT&T Fiber. They even go a step further by claiming their own policies prohibit spam [att.com] and then willfully violate it.

    Telling AT&T to accelerate SHAKEN/STIR adoption is like telling Ted Bundy and Jeffrey Dahmer to improve murder in

    • AT&Ts consumer marketing is atrocious, the amount of DirectTV mail I've received disgusts me to no end. I stopped doing business with AT&T years ago because of how bad they are in regards to unwanted marketing material. Totally agree they ignore opt-outs as well.
  • To show my appreciation, I'm going to forward all of my daily spam robocall messages to Rand Paul's office.

  • I have serious doubts this will do anything. The proof will be whether or not my phone becomes usable.

    And by usable, I mean whether or not I stop using my known contacts as an effective whitelist - if I don't have the caller in my phone I don't answer.

    These robocalls are killing the telephone.

  • by markdavis ( 642305 ) on Friday May 24, 2019 @07:39AM (#58646966)

    Look, I am all in favor of just about ANYTHING that will reduce phone spam. But the first thing, "stiffer fines", is UTTERLY MEANINGLESS. $10,000 per call? Why not make it $100,000 per call or $1,000,000 per call? It doesn't matter because there has been essentially zero enforcement and that won't change.

    1) It needs to be a CRIMINAL OFFENSE, not civil. This is the most important thing- without it, nothing will change.
    2) It needs a method for citizens (victims) to easily and quickly report such calls to someone/something that matters.
    3) It needs a body to actually investigate such reports.
    4) It needs that body to actually DO SOMETHING after the reports- like bring charges against offenders and convict.
    5) It needs to prevent such glaring exceptions for spammers like "political calls" or "non-profits" or "existing business relationships". That last one will be the excuse that really undoes any attempts to stop spam.
    6) But most of all, it needs to focus on technology improvements that strengthen and authenticate caller ID so all the above works.
    7) And that we can do all the same for calls that originate from outside of the USA.

    So, although I am glad to see the recent legislation moving forward, color me very skeptical it will make any difference. Really, based on how quickly these spammers change numbers and physical location and business models and company names, and how seriously incapable government is at actually implementing, executing, and enforcing good law, I think the only solution is technological- giving consumers the power to control their devices and who is allowed to call them.

    Right now there is almost nothing that can be done with actual land lines. And although cell phones have apps and such, they don't work well when they can only reject to voicemail (which is irritating to say the least because half the callers leave voicemail, which is almost as bad as the calls, themselves) and because most schemes have to rely on bogus caller ID or giving away all your privacy to 3rd or even 4th parties. Making all this even worse are websites and companies (like GOOGLE) that *insist* on knowing your phone number to do X or Y or Z.

    Sorry for the rant.

    • I agree with most if it. Prosecuting people outside of one's country is not always easy. I like the criminal offense bit.
  • I see nothing nowhere nohow that says having your telco block robocalls will be free. I'd welcome robocall blocking, but I refuse to pay for it.

    Right now I block all calls from callers outside of my contacts list. I try to be diligent, allowing those I want to call me to do so. Otherwise, anyone that can't get through, that should get through, most likely has my address. They can send me a snail-mail, and help to keep my mail carrier employed.

    I've done it this way for several

  • The only intelligent one was Senator Rand Paul that voted against it. Does Congress really think this will put a dent in robocalls? 99% of the robocalls I get have a thick accent from India. Last time I checked US law has no effect in India. This was a waste of time and paper and now it will be a waste of money trying to enforce this law. The only way to stop robocalls is to get dumb Americans to STOP falling for stupid scams and giving their money away.

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