Robots Can No Longer Fake-Call You With This New Law

In the United States, it is estimated that there are about 50 billion robocalls made in 2018, which is 46% more than in 2017. The US Senate has just held a vote to pass a bill to terminate robocalls once and for all.

There are 97 votes were in favor of and one vote was against The Telephone Robocall Abuse Criminal Enforcement and Deterrence Act (TRACED). This means that the robotcall bill has officially been approved, considering robocalling is clearly an issue that both parties want to exclude.

According to TRACED, illegal robocalls will be criminalized and the penalty fee for this behavior will also significantly be increased. Moreover, telecom providers are required to find ways to authenticate outgoing calls.

John Thune (R-SD), who co-introduced the law, said:

This new law may terminate robocalls forever.Authenticating calls is much more difficult than blocking them because it has certain limitations. STIR/SHAKEN technology allows service providers to determine whether a call comes from a real person or a spammer. The call must connect the two cooperated networks to use the authentication protocol.

Smartphone users will see something like "Caller Verified" in Caller ID, which helps them know for sure that the coming call is from an authentic location. However, STIR/SHAKEN cannot block calls. Federal Communications Ajit Pai praised this technology for being a big step towards putting an end to the scourge of robocalls.

In a statement, he said: