We all get them, and we all hate them. Robocalls. Fortunately, the FCC is finally going to do something about it. More accurately, they’re going to force wireless carriers to do something about it, and it’s good news for us.
The FCC has created a new database that all voice providers need to use to track the work they’re doing to stop robocalls. Specifically, any carrier doesn’t make it onto the list by September won’t be able to send calls to other carriers.
Spoofing
This is great because it should help stop spoofing, where spammers can pretend to be calling from any number they want when making their calls, which makes them quite difficult for us to stop. Blocking a spam number doesn’t help if they can call from a different number every time.
In my case lately, it’s even worse. My number seems to be one that spammers are spoofing and pretending to use a lot, so then regular folks are calling me “back”, quite upset about the robocall they just got from “me”. It’s chaos.
Since most major carriers are doing things to help prevent spoofing, any carrier that doesn’t won’t make it into the database — and spoofing should be just about over.
Engadget has some details if you want to read more, but this September should hopefully see the volume of robocalls drop off by quite a lot.
