On February 17, US Telecom released the Industry Traceback Group's (ITG) report, "Combatting Illegal Robocalls." The report highlights the ITG's progress and potential in addressing the extraordinarily high volume of unwanted and harmful robocalls received by Americans each day. Most of those calls originate from overseas and are route through four or more service providers, making traceback efforts a complex undertaking.
In July 2020, the FCC designated the ITG as the designated entity for coordinating industry efforts to trace the origin of suspected unlawful robocalls. As the report observes, ITG's primary focus is high-volume illegal robocall campaigns. Its operations are managed by a small team of employees and contractors who collaborate with industry and government personnel to identify the sources of those robocall campaigns.
The report identifies some of the ITG's achievements in fighting robocalls in 2020:
- Received 75 subpoenas/ civil investigative demands—up 275% from 2019
- Conducted approximately 215 tracebacks per month— up 115% from 2019 and 975% in 2018
- Initiated more than 2,500 tracebacks, representing hundreds of millions of calls
- Supported nearly one dozen enforcement actions involving nine distinct federal and state enforcement agencies, targeting nearly 50 individuals and entities
Another indication of the progress made by the ITG is reflected in the FCC's December 2020 TRACED Act Annual Report to Congress. According to the FCC's report:
The Industry Traceback Group's tracebacks have accelerated the investigation process. A single telephone call may pass through multiple providers from the point of origin to the destination. Until very recently, each link in the chain required a separate subpoena from the FCC, FTC, or other agency to the handling provider. The length of time it takes to find the suspected violator depends on how quickly investigators can get to the origin point of the calls. The more links in the chain, the longer the investigation time. The Industry Traceback Group’s efforts reduce the number of subpoenas agencies must issue to do the same work. For example, in a recent case with four links between the originating provider and the customer’s provider, the Commission worked with the Industry Traceback Group to trace the origin of the call. As a result, a traceback that would have taken at least four separate subpoenas and 2 to 3 months to complete was successfully traced back in less than 24 hours.
The ITG has its work cut out for it. The YouMail Robocall Index estimated that 4.6 billion robocalls, amounting to 14.1 per person, were sent during the month of February 2021 – the highest volume seen in the last twelve months. But the ITG has compiled a strong track record in coordinating with enforcement agencies and reducing traceback times, and it hopefully will build on that record in 2021.
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