Attorney General Peter F. Kilmartin today joined 44 other state attorneys general calling on five major phone companies to offer call-blocking technology to their customers. In a joint letter (link to letter) to the chief executives of the carriers, 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."
Attorney General Kilmartin 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," said Attorney General Kilmartin. "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."
Attorney General Kilmartin 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, Kilmartin called on the FCC to allow phone companies to utilize call-blocking technologies. The FCC chairman endorsed the request in late May and the FCC voted to pass the rule clarification on June 18.
The attorneys general offices that signed today's letter are: Alabama, Alaska, Arkansas, California, Colorado, Connecticut, Delaware, District of Columbia, Florida, Georgia, Hawaii, Idaho, Illinois, Indiana, Iowa, Kansas, Kentucky, Maine, Maryland, Michigan, Minnesota, Mississippi, Missouri, Montana, Nebraska, Nevada, New Hampshire, New Mexico, New York, North Carolina, North Dakota, Ohio, Oregon, Pennsylvania, Rhode Island, South Carolina, South Dakota, Tennessee, Utah, Vermont, Virginia, Washington, West Virginia, Wisconsin, and Wyoming.