Letter to the editor

Reader pens letter to local officials on robocalls

Posted

Editor’s Note: A reader sent an email to local officials requesting assistance with robocalls.

As a local official, I ask that you encourage GVTC to incorporate necessary changes to reduce these nuisance and criminal calls.

Last week the major phone companies along with the attorney generals of all 50 states announced a plan the crackdown on robocalls.

Robocaller technology searches for unprotected lines and shares that with other robocallers. As more and more are protected the frequency escalates exponentially for those folks that remain unprotected, like GVTC. By actual count, we have received 21 in the past 4 days.

Searching for personal solutions. Some providers, such as Spectrum Communications, offer third-party solutions through their sites. GVTC is not.

GVTC customer service was not aware of any plans to combat them when I called Friday, although he was very sympathetic.

Under the national plan, service providers will help provide technology, known to industry insiders as SHAKEN/STIR, to combat that practice and aid state attorney generals in locating and prosecuting the fraudulent robocallers.

The Federal Communications Commission describes the technology as allowing a phone network receiving a call to verify that it comes from the number it purports to before it reaches the customer.

Take Care & Thanks.

James Ryan

Gonzales

Comments