The Utah Attorney General’s office has joined a task force of attorneys general from 27 states in threatening phone service providers in nine states with shutdown for what Utah Attorney General Derek Brown and his counterparts in other states call the “robocall ecosystem” across the country.
The Federal Communication Commission says its top consumer complaint is unwanted calls, numbering in the tens of thousands of complaints monthly. The AG group says that artificial intelligence has pushed the limits on the robocalls that many experience. Known phone numbers are “spoofed,” voices of public figures, including presidential candidates, were imitated with “deepfake” technology; vulnerable people are scammed; and emergency medical communications and 911 call centers can be disrupted, according to an FCC report.
The AGs are supporting a rehearing by the National Consumer Law Center in a case between the Insurance Marketing Coalition Limited and the Federal Communications Commission. The AGs seek to defend a rule by the FCC that stops telemarketers from obtaining and selling consumers’ phone numbers to robocallers without their consent.
In a statement to media, Brown said robocalls “target the most vulnerable members of our society. This FCC policy would cut off robocalls at the source. It is critical that we protect Utahns from scams that can lead to them losing millions of dollars.”
In 2017, the commission reversed its stance on call blocking without consumer consent, allowing voice service providers to block certain calls “purporting to be from invalid, unallocated or unused numbers and numbers on a Do-Not-Originate list,” the report says. A Robocall Mitigation Database was started in 2021, and other methods and requirements have been implemented to curb the onslaught of calls. Those rules continue to be revised as the landscape evolves.
In 2022, 51 attorneys general, led by North Carolina Attorney General Jeff Jackson, Indiana Attorney General Todd Rokita and Ohio Attorney General Dave Yost, created the Anti-Robocall Litigation Task Force to take legal action against companies that are part of what they call the “robocalls ecosystem.”
They began sending notices to service providers in November 2023. Eight providers were put on notice that month. Nine letters were sent earlier this month by the group. In total, 16 providers have been sent letters; many of the recent notices were “second and final notice” letters threatening legal action.