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A New Senate Bill Would Hit Robocallers With Up To a $10,000 Fine For Every Call (gizmodo.com)
Massachusetts Democratic Senator Ed Markey and South Dakota Republican Senator John Thune have introduced a bill on Friday that aims to ramp up the penalties on illegal robocalls and stop scammers from sending them. Gizmodo reports: The Telephone Robocall Abuse Criminal Enforcement and Deterrence (TRACED) Act, raises the penalty for robocalls from $1,500 per call to up to $10,000 per call, and allows the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) to take action on illegal robocalls up to three years after the calls are placed, instead of a year. The Act also aims to push the FCC to work along with the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, Department of Justice, Department of Homeland Security, Federal Trade Commission (FTC), and other agencies to provide information to Congress about advancements in hindering robocall and prosecuting scammers. Perhaps most importantly for us highly annoyed Americans, the bill would also force phone service providers to use call authentication that filters out illegitimate calls before they go through to consumers.
... wake me up when they charge the telcos for every robocall they don't filter. That will make a change.
I personally get at least two calls a day on my land line from these assholes as it is, and I was getting almost five a day during this past election season. If it wasn't for the fact I can't get any cellular service where I live I would shut the line off entirely. In terms of the former it's somewhat interesting that I hear the exact same voice even though they seem to be from entirely different companies trying to get something out of me.
And on the point of my later statement, one thing that really should be done is a change in the law to block political robocalls. Those are currently except from the FCC regulations of those. There's just no way to keep those mother fuckers from calling you if you're on a land line.
I forward all calls to Google voice. Works very well. Pity they'll inevitably fuck it up because, you know, that's what Google does.
But for now it filters Red Cross spam very well, and the transcription let's me see those that slip through at a glance.
If FBI sets up honey pots, take the bait, follow up, go up the chain and fine the people who hire these robo callers, then it might have some effect. Otherwise you can even call for death penalty, it wont have any effect.
sed -e 's/Chuck Norris/Rajnikant/g' joke > fact
This is going to change things if it happens here's why:
Bounty hunters. If it's really 10K$ per call, I can offer to split my share with a bounty hunter who will track down the Mofo and collect.
Some drink at the fountain of knowledge. Others just gargle.
Robocalls work because they do thousands of them. If you caught one of the guys $1500 per call is already going to be millions, if not billions and maybe trillions.
Also, we know damn well how to stop Robocalls, you stop them at the source by making AT&T et al police their bloody network. They don't do this because they're making money off the robocalls.
So once again, I smell bullshit. More political theater to distract me and you from real issues like healthcare, wages and those 8 bloomin' wars we're fighting....
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Shouldn't the end-user get a percentage of that fine? That would make me want to almost sign up, just until I could validate the caller. Then whack, I get $5k. That would be awesome.
>"Broadens the authority of the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) to levy civil penalties of up to $10,000 per call"
*CIVIL* penalty. So nothing will change. It needs to be a CRIMINAL penalty with a way to tip off for enforcement. NOBODY is going to do the work needed to try and find out who it is so they can spend thousands of dollars and hundreds of hours to "sue" them.
>"Extends the window for the FCC to catch and take civil enforcement action against"
So the FCC will take civil action? Doesn't do much of squat right now on that front. Every few years we hear of maybe one high-profile case. And how has that worked out? They could increase suing by 100 times and it wouldn't make a dent.
>"Brings together the Department of Justice..."
Yawn
>"Requires providers of voice services to adopt call authentication technologies, enabling a telephone carrier to verify that incoming calls are legitimate before they reach consumersâ(TM) phones."
THAT has some glimmer of hope. Not much though, since it only helps with spoofing and tracking by the end user. Doesn't actually stop the calls.
>"Directs the FCC to initiate a rulemaking..."
Yawn again.
Color me pessimistic but still hopeful...
to the telco. Financial incentive to the telco would fix it. As it is, the telco profits from the extra biz.
So, the act wants to engage the FCC (currently run by a former lobbiest) with the CPB, also compromised and basically useless, to combat something that makes someone money.
Uh...huh.
And y'all buy that this is useful? Lol
Your mind is like a parachute. It works best when it's been opened.
This is an agency with broad authority, but no accountability to or oversite by elected officials.
https://www.washingtonpost.com...
It got so absurd that the former head of the CFPB felt he had the authority to name his own replacement. And their budget comes from the fed and not Congress.
The public switched telephone network isn't any more point-to-point than the internet is. In fact, you know why Ethernet cables have telephone style connectors? Any guess what the "switched network" means in "public switched telephone network?". Think that's anything like the network switch you use for internet? It's precisely the same network, that's why it uses the same connectors and equipment. Some newer companies focus on IP traffic, but all the original backbone ISPs were the traditional phone companies.
A T1 line is a 1.54 Mbps like which typically carries 24 voice channels. It can also carry 1.54 Mbps of data, or a combination of the two. It was originally used just for voice.
Your telephone call / internet traffic does have a point-to-point link from your computer to your switch (which is typically in the same housing as your router). Even inside your home, though, i's a network, many things connect to each other the same switch. Nothing point to point about the phone *network*.
My upstream telephone provider has absolutely no way to know if I've set the caller ID correctly when I forward a call, no more than the next company whom they pass the call to knows.
I hope this will help them fine the crap out of them and slow them down or put them out of business. I get 10 fake/scam calls a day!
If any way existed of finding robocallers, there would already be apps that could nail them. Some robocalls on business VoIP can be filtered (nomorobo.com) but this scheme does not work for most consumer lines.
Does this bill totally outlaw spoofing of Caller ID by locking in the ID when a line is provisioned?
I get a junk robocall almost every day and most who I know get more. 100 million a day in America is probably a conservative estimate. That would make $1500 a call a $150 billion per day fine rate if the fines were effective. Clearly they are not being utilized.
Make it so caller id can not be spoofed. Not sure if that is possible. At least make it a major crime to spoof caller id. I'll allow id blocking since there are times when that is necessary (anonymous tips, etc.). Make the telcos responsible for enforcing it (as much as is feasible).
-- Will program for bandwidth
This bill allows the FCC, to use resources from the FTC which can levee greater fines and has authority over the stocks and the exchanges on which they are traded, as well as the ability to call on DHS and DOJ which have personnel to kick in doors and investigators to follow up get warrants and seize equipment. In addition to extending the time in which infractions can be enforced as well as a much higher ceiling on the fines they can levee.
Of course it still has to pass through Congress and as you say be enforced but at least the tools are being provided if the proper authorities have the backbone to use them.
errr....umm...*whooosh* *whoosh* Is this thing on ?
A single robo call should get them a mandatory spot on a reality TV show for on-air castration or fucking by razor dildo (depending on sex of the individual) so the punishment matches the crime. Spammers too.
Just use standard methods.
All we really need to do is ban caller ID spoofing.
Reverse charging is probably the ONLY thing that will prevent this. Want to call me? You need a validated credit card that deposits a tenth of a penny into my account. If this service was available, I would sign up for it in an instant. Robocalls would drop to very nearly zero and they would stay there.
Anyone? That's a pretty large sample size.
By the way, you're a fucking idiot. You think businesses and banks and industry are texting each other?
What the fuck is it with you millennials? You really do think that the world is a mirror of your habits, don't you?
If you don't have the skills to make a coherent phone call good luck getting a job.. It's permanent basement dwelling for you.
I cancelled my land line and block and ignore callers not in my contact list.
You're either full of shit or an idiot. Which is it?
You block callers not on your contact list? Right...... so when that Hospital calls to tell you that insert-loved-ones-name-here has been in a terrible accident, you're sending the call to the bit bucket?
Bullshit.
"By the way, you're a fucking idiot. You think businesses and banks and industry are texting each other?"
Yes. Yes they are. 90% of my business revolves around some form of text messaging or voice over internet service, be it emails, wechat, Facebook, Skype, facetime, etc. My Bank even Skypes me and text messages me. And I'm in the manufacturing business. Fun fact, rest of the world is using these services on a daily basis for business. Being in denial of this is quite the delusion.
There's a good reason why Microsoft is restructuring their whole business services with outlook and Skype. Maybe you might not use these services for your business and industry, but a whole lot of people do.
You block callers not on your contact list? Right...... so when that Hospital calls to tell you that insert-loved-ones-name-here has been in a terrible accident, you're sending the call to the bit bucket?
I'd say yes. As a policy, I ignore unknown numbers. Trained professionals will leave a professional message that will not say much, but will get my attention. Family members will too, even if the message is less secure. 99% of scammers will not leave a message, because the long life of their continuing con demands that no individual mark be given the opportunity to call back at our convenience and report a long-lived landline to the police. So all voicemail is potentially true (or super-rare scams where the con points to an ephemeral website).
When someone you know is sick or dying, there will be multiple calls anyway. Your blood will not save them, so your presence will not result in a life-giving choice... more of a comfort visit. If important enough, one of the callers is going to be your mother or sibling. They will be in your whitelist our your eye will recognize those numbers. Ignoring numbers does cause frequent anger from my loved ones, but I won't budge. Appealing to an emotional plea to open a backdoor for events with a lottery-ticket frequency of, say 1 / 10,000 odds / year requires my budging 100%.
I'm not opening a front door attack-surface by picking up robocalls. They are a proven annoyance from a source programmed to call me tirelessly once per day using different fake numbers. This is like the NoScript decision to block everything because so little is worth it and we prefer manual we approve of instead of the industry's move toward relentless push of every little random notification and promo offer.
Interestingly to your point, there HAS been an increase of the presence of loved ones in the scammers' toolset in the past decade. Old folks tend to be targeted because their age and household is known public data that anyone can release with a name and address for a couple bucks online. Someone I know who is of retirement-age got a call from someone young that apparently imitated a teen acquaintance living a few thousand miles away. After a couple calls from both sides for the important-sounding accident or tragedy, something clicked before the money got lost. In trying to trace things to a culprit, they only found that the young guy in question apparently knew nothing about the tragedy when a second phone number got involved. The would-be victim concluded that either he tried to scam her and making accusations to the guardians wasn't worth it in the greater scheme of things because their families aren't all that close...or this youngsters' friends (known hooligans) posed as him. In most cases I've heard about on the web, the scam comes in the form of online dating where an enthusiastic girl overseas becomes interested in you and soon into this long-distance relationship will suffer these "unfortunate" needs and ghost the victim after they get a few thousand bucks.
Many savvy slashdotters may detect these. Pros don't target our demographic for the same reasons we don't trust in "Microsoft says you have a virus" popups and recent phone calls. Again, age-data exists that allows calling retired old folks.
But I still don't just pick up the phone for odd-looking numbers because the neural net is trained to look negatively on unsolicited numbers.
Will the bill include spam?
No no no.. The AC said "Does anyone use the phone anymore?"
Everyone is running around with a phone.. All physical businesses have landlines.. 100% of them where I'm at.. 100%. Not 99%. I specify physical businesses.. The kind you walk into.. Bank, restaurant, car dealership, auto-mechanic, etc... (as opposed to people who own a business with no physical location for customer interaction)..
I'm not going to accuse you of lying, but I think you're mistaken if you really think 90% of your businesses is somehow avoiding the phone network. Your end might be voip, but I'd honestly be surprised if the other half of your phone conversations are avoiding the POTS at 90%..
I built cell sites for a decade, and every single one had a T-1 line as a backup for emergencies.. That's POTS.. That's 1964 technology.. Because it's reliable. This isn't old stats either.. I left the cell industry just a couple years ago.
I don't dispute that your preferred methods are gaining ground and will only increase as time goes on, but RIGHT NOW.. no.. HALF of Americans still have a landline.. That's 150,000,000 people right there.. Just one country.. Phones aren't going away any time soon.
It's a fine, not a bounty. If you got even $10 for reporting robocalls that would do the job. But this is not an attempt to fix the robocall problem, this is a money grab combined with selective enforcement. The government will pocket the fines and I double guarantee you that not one cent of it will be used for robocall reduction.
"You're right," Fisheye says. "I should have set it on 'whip' or 'chop.'"
I have a physical address. I have a very large warehouse. The phone maybe gets 10% use at most by my CSRs. Everything is online. The vast majority of my suppliers use Skype. All my customers are either email (Most of the time don't even hear their voice) or some other form of voice over the internet. Everything international is almost majority done on WeChat or Skype. And I agree with you, probably that landline I have isn't going away soon, but I'm at the point I can't justify paying $1000 a month for 10% business, when there are offers that give you an 800 number that dials straight to you in whatever format you want. And yes, I have a T-1 line as a backup phone and internet, why the high price (TPx aka Telepacific, I can't wait to get rid of them). So definitely in the future that POTS is going away soon, perhaps really soon for me.
Also realize that 150,000,000 million people with a landline is a rapidly diminishing number, most of them probably just bundled with an internet deal while the phone never gets used.
Robocallers have already relocated their call centers offshore, where US law doesn't reach. Good luck with collecting those fines!
Robocallers have already moved their call centers to Canada, Mexico, or anywhere else, where US law doesn't reach. Good luck collecting those fines!
I'm not the original poster but I do the same thing. The hospital (or anyone else who has a legitimate need to contact me) will leave voicemail. My phone tells me I have voicemail and shows me a transcript. I call them back. Easy.
You tell me. On the whole I feel pretty decent about it, but I'm starting to feel a Sisyphean futility to it all. Spammers know no one will bother tracking them down, so they're starting to leave voicemail much more often. So, I'm still being somewhat annoyed, but less so than if I'd had to listen to "Rachel from Card Services" blather at me yet again.
Currently one of the spammers' favorite tricks is to spoof their phone number so it looks like it's coming from the same area code and exchange as your number. My phone is from a different area code, so if I get a call from one of those numbers that isn't in my contacts it's guaranteed to be someone I don't want to talk to. It's pretty damned unlikely that I'm going to get an actual emergency call from a number I don't know 500 miles away.
Chelloveck
I give up on debugging. From now on, SIGSEGV is a feature.
without enforcement.
And yes, I have a T-1 line as a backup phone and internet, why the high price (TPx aka Telepacific, I can't wait to get rid of them).
Part of the reason for the high price of a T-1 line is that it is a federally regulated service. By law the telco has 4 hours to diagnose the problem on the T-1 line (once you report it to them) and then develop a plan to fix it.
I was, in addition to a cellular tech, a T-1 technician (MST) with AT&T. T-1's took priority over EVERYTHING. The FCC fines for failure to correct certain problems within certain time frames were horrendous. But, that's why they cost so much. I don't recall if it was mandated or simply a perk, but the rule of thumb for both AT&T and Telepacific (I had a T-1 from them for 3 years) was to pick up the phone on a trouble call before the 4th ring. No voicemail... A human operator had to be on the phone before the 4th ring began. I can say this, I never ever heard a 4th ring.. Not once.. I don't think I even heard a 3rd ring.
That level of service extends to the biz class fiber circuits. I currently have a gig line (simplex as opposed to main and protect) from AT&T and have never heard a 3rd ring either.. Expensive ($1700/month), but where I'm at, there aren't any other choices..
Yet you want the government to step in and play mommy and daddy for everybody.
As long as it's filled with republicans and corporate whores (but I repeat myself) it won't do that. But it's still the entity which should.
"You're right," Fisheye says. "I should have set it on 'whip' or 'chop.'"
"TRACED" Act? Really?