AT&T TRIES TO GET TOUGH WITH ROBOCALLERS
Have you been hoping that government and industry working hand-in-hand will finally put an end to those annoying sales pitches that millions of Americans receive over their telephones just as they’re sitting down to supper?
Telecom giant AT&T, which got its hand slapped recently by the Federal Communications Commission for its inability to stop the scourge of robocalls, says CEO Randall Stephenson is really taking off the gloves now by creating a “Robocalling Strike Force.”
We’ll forgive you if you’re not holding your breath.
After all, we’ve seen years of efforts by our federal government and the robocalling, er, telecommunications industry to stop this computer-generated scourge without any huge success. I mean, the calls keep coming, so something ain’t working. Even tech tools specially created to halt the calls certainly haven’t proven foolproof.
The call to arms is way overdue. Americans have sustained a constant barrage of obnoxious verbal intrusions in their homes by lowlifes trying to scam them or simply sell them stuff they don’t need and don’t want in the first place. My wife complains when I slam down the receiver on robocallers, saying, “They’re just doing their job.”
Well, it’s not MY job to suffer their indignities, is it? AT&T’s announcement comes a couple of
months after its chief executive admitted there wasn’t really any way to totally stop these callers. Isn’t that amazing? Here we are in the Golden Age of Tech, with Silicon Valley startups spewing a steady flow of amazing, life-changing, world-improving ideas (Uber, anyone?), and our telecom brain trust can’t find the off switch for crooks outsmarting them on their own networks.
Stephenson said recently that his company doesn’t have “permission” or “the appropriate authority” to block the calls, despite the FCC’s statements clearly giving carriers a “green light” to set up anti-robocall services for cellphone users. Just last week, FCC Chairman Tom Wheeler urged carriers to “offer call-blocking services to their customers now — at no cost,” and AT&T has decided to play ball.