–says recent FCC ruling opens door for companies to protect their customers–
Jefferson City, Mo. – Attorney General Chris Koster and Indiana Attorney General Greg Zoeller today led 43 other state attorneys general in calling on five major phone companies to offer call-blocking technology to their customers. In a joint letter to the chief executives of the companies, the attorneys general said a new Federal Communications Commission (FCC) rule clarification allows telecommunication service providers to offer customers the ability to block unwanted calls, and verifies that federal law does not prohibit offering the services.
In the letter to AT&T, Sprint, Verizon, T-Mobile and CenturyLink, the attorneys general stated, “Every year, our offices are flooded with consumer complaints pleading for a solution to stop intrusive robocalls. Your companies are now poised to offer your customers the help they need. We urge you to act without delay.”
Koster said phone carriers had previously claimed they could not offer such services. At a July 2013 hearing before a Senate subcommittee, representatives from the US Telecom Association and CTIA testified that “legal barriers prevent carriers from implementing advanced call-blocking technology to reduce the number of unwanted telemarketing calls.”
“The FCC has made it clear that phone companies can assist us in our fight against unwanted, annoying, and sometimes expensive calls,” Koster said. “We will continue to press these phone carriers to give their customers what they have been asking for – a way to stop these calls before they ever come through.”
Koster said call-blocking options already exist for Voice over Internet Protocol (VoIP) phone service (NoMoRobo.com) and Android cell phones (Call Control), and the phone carriers should move quickly to implement and inform their consumers of these options.
Last September, 39 attorneys general, led by Koster and Zoeller, called on the FCC to allow phone companies to utilize call-blocking technologies. In June, Deputy Attorney General Joe Dandurand testified before the FCC in support of the rule clarification. The FCC chairman endorsed the request in late May and the FCC voted to pass the rule clarification on June 18.
