FCC Submits Report to Congress on Robocalls and Caller ID Scams

On December 23, the FCC submitted to Congress the latest version of its Report on Robocalls and Transmission of Misleading or Inaccurate Caller Identification Information. The annual report is required by the TRACED Act. It contains data regarding informal consumer complaints to the FCC regarding robocalls, Commission enforcement actions, and an overview of private efforts to combat unwanted and harmful robocalls.  

The report cites data indicating 37,736 informal consumer complaints were filed at the FCC regarding robocalls during the first eleven months of 2022. Thus, it appears likely that informal complaints about robocalls were slightly lower in all of 2022 compared to a year prior. There were 46,189 such complaints in 2021. Also, the report cites data indicating that 37,752 informal complaints regarding caller ID spoofing were filed in the first eleven months of 2022, indicating that yearly total for such complaints was notably less than the 57,075 complaints filed in 2021. (Note: A single filed complaint can involve more than one reported instance of an illegal robocall or a call from a spoofed ID.)

 

Among the actions taken by the FCC in 2022 to combat unwanted and illegal robocalls – many of which originate from foreign countries – the report acknowledged the Commission's 2022 Gateway Provider Order. The order requires gateway providers to respond to traceback requests within 24 hours, block calls that clearly are conduits for illegal voice traffic, and implement "known your upstream obligations." Under the order, gateway providers are required to apply STIR/SHAKEN caller ID authentication technology to all unauthenticated foreign-originated session-initiated protocol (SIP) calls with U.S. North American Numbering Plan (NANP) numbers by June 30, 2023. 

 

Regarding private efforts to combat robocalls and caller ID spoofing, the report provided an overview of the progress of the Industry Traceback Group to identify the path and origin of illegal robocalls in order to stop them. According to the report:

[B]etween January 1, 2022 and November 21, 2022, the Industry Traceback Group initiated over 2,600 tracebacks, a traceback initiation rate which is 10% higher than in 2021 and 20% higher than in 2020. The Industry Traceback Group also played a key role in combating the scourge of illegal robocalling campaigns from foreign-based providers. In addition to identifying 146 U.S.-based providers suspected of originating apparently illegal robocalls, the Industry Traceback Group also identified 82 foreign-based originating providers and 145 U.S. gateway providers. 

Additionally, the report notes that the Industry Traceback Group is working with providers to incorporate STIR/SHAKEN into the traceback process.  Hopefully, the expanded implementation of STIR/SHAKEN and traceback efforts will further curb illegal robocalls. 

However, it ought to be recognized that STIR/SHAKEN's utility is likely limited to the context of voice calls made using NANP numbers – and that it is not a technology that ought to be imposed by administrative agency rule on providers of text messaging services. 

That basic point is made in my January 4, 2023 Perspectives from FSF Scholars, "Innovation Will Protect Consumers From Illegal Text Messages Better Than New FCC Rules." As explained in that paper, the FCC has proposed a blocking and caller ID requirement on wireless providers for text messaging services despite the fact that there does not appear to be any solid evidence that text messages from invalid, unallocated, or unused numbers are a problem for wireless consumers. Wireless providers already provide up-front vetting for would-be senders of mass text messages. It is unlikely that such a costly mandate actually would reduce the volume of illegal robotexts and protect consumers. And although the Commission's notice of proposed rulemaking appears to favor requiring the STIR/SHAKEN to combat illegal texts, even the agency acknowledges that the technology doesn't exist for text messaging services. Voice and text messaging technologies are different, and so it should be no surprise that the best solutions to combatting illegal robocalls and robotexts also are different. For more details, see my Perspectives.

Report Reviews Industry Traceback Group's Efforts Against Unwanted Robocalls

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. 

FCC Order Encourages Blocking of Bad Robocalls

At its July 17 public meeting, the FCC took its latest step to curb unwanted and unlawful robocalls. The Commission adopted an order to implement the TRACED Act by establishing rules for two safe harbors from legal liability for voice service providers that block robocalls that they believe are unwanted or harmful. Those legal safe harbors will encourage voice service providers to combat unwanted and unlawful robocalls. Paragraph 19 of the Commission's order sums up the action taken in its order:

[W]e adopt a safe harbor from liability under the Communications Act and our rules for terminating voice service providers that block calls based on reasonable analytics designed to identify unwanted calls, so long as those take into account information provided by STIR/SHAKEN (or, for non-IP based calls, any other effective call authentication framework that satisfies the TRACED Act) when such information is available for a particular call. And we establish a second safe harbor enabling voice service providers to block traffic from bad-actor upstream voice service providers that continue to allow unwanted calls to traverse their networks. Finally, we require that blocking providers furnish a single point of contact to resolve unintended or inadvertent blocking, and emphasize that, when blocking, they should make all reasonable efforts to ensure that critical calls, such as those from Public Safety Answering Points (PSAPs), are not blocked and that they should never block calls to 911. 

Importantly, the order includes provisions for allowing blocked callers to reach voice service providers and seek the undoing of blockages of legit calls. The point of the safe harbors is to incentive blocking of unwanted and illegal calls and thereby protect consumers – and not to censor speech. This is an important measure adopted by the Commission and hopefully will lead to the reduction of bad robocalls.