FCC votes to allow carriers to block robocalls by default
Last month, it was reported that the FCC was going to take a vote in which they were considering blocking robocalls on a carrier level. This means that customers won’t need to do anything on their end and that all the blocking will be done by carriers. The good news is that it looks like the vote has passed and that the FCC has voted to allow carriers to block robocalls by default.
According to FCC Chairman Ajit Pai:
“There is one thing in our country today that unites Republicans and Democrats, liberals and conservatives, socialists and libertarians, vegetarians and carnivores, Ohio State and Michigan fans: It is that they are sick and tired of being bombarded by unwanted robocalls. My message to the American people today is simple. We hear you, and we are on your side.”
Now, this is a bit different from what we had previously heard, in which the vote was to make it so that carriers had to block robocalls by default. This makes it sound like carriers will now have the option to do so, but can choose not to. This raises some interesting questions because carriers who might sell robocall-blocking tools and services might choose to leave blocking off until a customer signs up for it.
So far, carriers such as Verizon have enabled the feature for free and by turning it on by default, it means that customers will need to actually call in to their carrier and opt out of the protection, although we can’t really imagine who would want to do so.
Source: CNN