When is the last time you saw an unfamiliar number pop up on your phone and found yourself hesitating to answer? Robocalls have become such a common experience in the U.S. that they are often the subject of jokes. “I’m calling you about your car’s extended warranty” has become an internationally recognized tagline associated with robocall scams. While car warranty scams might now be easy for the average person to spot because of their prevalence, there are many other robocall scams that may be harder to spot.
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As robocalls become a favorite tool of scam artists around the world, many telecom providers are unsure of what their obligations are in preventing these calls. In this article, we will walk through the reasoning behind employing attestation software and how the TRACED Act increased the responsibility of telecom providers in terms of authenticating their users. Next, we will explain what attestation software is and what you should look for when adopting attestation software. Finally, we will make some recommendations as to how you can effectively outsource your robocall mitigation efforts to stay in alignment with the TRACED Act.
Why should we be verifying the trustworthiness of our users with attestation software?
The reason why telecom providers are now concerned with attestation software is that they are now required to authenticate users. In 2019, the U.S. Congress passed the TRACED Act, which requires telecom providers to take reasonable steps to authenticate their users in an effort to aid in robocall mitigation.
The FCC is now holding telecom providers responsible for taking the steps necessary to authenticate the identity of their users. This means that if you are not verifying the trustworthiness of your users, you are at risk of being hit with fines or other actions from the FCC. At YouMail, where we specialize in robocall mitigation, we have seen a significant increase in FCC cease & desist letters. If telecommunications providers and vendors don’t take steps to comply with the TRACED act, they could risk serious damages due to poor compliance and management.
Simply put, the TRACED Act requires the FCC to assess and report on call authentications in order to ultimately mitigate robocalls better. The FCC pushes that down to service providers, and they then need to employ high-quality attestation software to help with robocall mitigation. The act was signed into law on December 31, 2019, and it gave telecom providers 18 months to demonstrate that they were making “reasonable progress” towards adopting attestation software that allows for the attestation of calls made on their networks.
The Traced Act was passed when lawmakers realized accurate identification of telecommunication network users is the first step to putting a stop to illegal robocalls. The TRACED Act was passed with the purpose of protecting vulnerable people from fraud, but it also indirectly helps the telecommunication companies themselves, because allowing fraudulent calls to go unchecked can have significant detrimental effects on the reputation of providers.
In its most straightforward definition, attestation software is created to certify or provide evidence of something. In the case of telecom providers, attestation software focuses on authenticating calls made via the telecom provider’s network.
The main purpose of attestation software is to help with robocall mitigation. After all, you can not put a stop to unlawful usage of your telecommunication network if you don’t first identify if a caller is who they say they are, or is using the service unlawfully. Proper attestation software can provide the evidence necessary to put a stop to bad actors.
If you are looking to adopt attestation software, you want to look for something that uses the STIR/SHAKEN technology standard. STIR/SHAKEN is an acronym meaning Secure Telephony Identity Revisited (STIR) and Secure Handling of Asserted information using toKENs (SHAKEN).
YouMailPS systems use the STIR/SHAKEN technology standard. Our attestation software was created specifically to help service providers maintain compliance with the TRACED Act. Protective services like YouMailPS for user authentication are subject matter experts that understand the ins and outs of FCC requirements and expectations, and often end up being less costly and more accurate than internal IT resources.
No one wants to be hit with a hefty FCC fine or wants to spend more time and effort needed on government regulations. At YouMailPS, we offer a robocall mitigation service specifically designed for communication service providers and vendors to help reduce the risk of FCC fines and actions. We will help you adopt attestation software that will keep you in compliance with the TRACED Act and the FCC. You can read more about the services offered by YouMailPS here >