<story><title>US Anti-Robocall Litigation Task Force</title><url>https://www.thecentersquare.com/national/nationwide-anti-robocall-litigation-task-force-created-to-fight-estimated-29-8b-in-scam-call/article_e3dfd458-129f-11ed-b714-7b059dbcf5e7.html</url></story><parent_chain><item><author>lotsofpulp</author><text>&amp;gt;My wide-open Verizon cell-phone number is my least preferred method of contact by far, due to the fact that I cannot trust that unknown numbers are high-value incoming calls.&lt;p&gt;I thought it was a legal requirement for phone network operators to leave phone numbers accessible to all, and hence their inability to effectively fight spam.&lt;p&gt;Otherwise, what would stop the situation from becoming like email, where email is more likely to be delivered if sent from a big player and less likely from a small player.</text></item><item><author>brk</author><text>It is unfortunate that the cellular companies have allowed their core product (voice calls) to be so devalued that they need to be forced to solve this problem instead of just doing it naturally.&lt;p&gt;The carriers are clearly customer-hostile, as this is really a very solvable problem.  Instead, we now are moving to alternate mechanisms to manage audio calls (eg: Signal, Whatsapp, Facebook, etc.).  My wide-open Verizon cell-phone number is my least preferred method of contact by far, due to the fact that I cannot trust that unknown numbers are high-value incoming calls.</text></item></parent_chain><comment><author>onetimeusename</author><text>Over the last few years the FCC rules on carriers were relaxed so that they can discriminate against calls originating from domestic networks. Previously they could not block calls even if it was obvious it was a scam call. However, it&amp;#x27;s not always obvious which robo calls are legitimate and which aren&amp;#x27;t.&lt;p&gt;The bigger issue though is not about domestic origin calls, it&amp;#x27;s about foreign originated calls that the FCC has no power over. The domestic carriers had to forward these calls. There is traction gaining to require that calls that originate overseas verify their identity to US based networks. Domestic carriers can reject calls that don&amp;#x27;t verify (spoofed numbers that originate offshore).&lt;p&gt;That still may not stop all the spam calls but it will slow it down. The problem here is really that telephony became extremely cheap and accessible to the whole world.</text></comment>
<story><title>US Anti-Robocall Litigation Task Force</title><url>https://www.thecentersquare.com/national/nationwide-anti-robocall-litigation-task-force-created-to-fight-estimated-29-8b-in-scam-call/article_e3dfd458-129f-11ed-b714-7b059dbcf5e7.html</url></story><parent_chain><item><author>lotsofpulp</author><text>&amp;gt;My wide-open Verizon cell-phone number is my least preferred method of contact by far, due to the fact that I cannot trust that unknown numbers are high-value incoming calls.&lt;p&gt;I thought it was a legal requirement for phone network operators to leave phone numbers accessible to all, and hence their inability to effectively fight spam.&lt;p&gt;Otherwise, what would stop the situation from becoming like email, where email is more likely to be delivered if sent from a big player and less likely from a small player.</text></item><item><author>brk</author><text>It is unfortunate that the cellular companies have allowed their core product (voice calls) to be so devalued that they need to be forced to solve this problem instead of just doing it naturally.&lt;p&gt;The carriers are clearly customer-hostile, as this is really a very solvable problem.  Instead, we now are moving to alternate mechanisms to manage audio calls (eg: Signal, Whatsapp, Facebook, etc.).  My wide-open Verizon cell-phone number is my least preferred method of contact by far, due to the fact that I cannot trust that unknown numbers are high-value incoming calls.</text></item></parent_chain><comment><author>brk</author><text>There is nothing preventing them from providing users with more granular call-rejection controls.  Their networks need to be &amp;quot;accessible&amp;quot; on the incoming call side, but that does not mean as a customer I should be forced to have every call intended for my number to be routed through to my phone.&lt;p&gt;An iptables concept with a user friendly UI would address much of this problem, particularly if we could filter on useful call origination data, or lack thereof.</text></comment>