AT&T chief to head robocall ‘strike force’

In response to FCC chair Tom Wheeler's call for all major phone companies to provide robocall-blocking tools in the hands of customers, AT&T CEO Randall Stephens said he would lead an industry ''Strike Force'' to combat robocalls.(See: FCC asks telecoms to offer robocall blocking services free to users).

The AT&T Public Policy Blog, states that the new ''Robocalling Strike Force'' would ''accelerate the development and adoption of new tools and solutions to abate the proliferation of robocalls and to make recommendations to the FCC on the role government can play in this battle.''

While Wheeler's letters to Stephenson and the other telecom CEOs did not call for a Strike Force, the chair did call on these companies to work together toward certain solutions.

The measures included a ''Do Not Originate List,'' which would block certain robocalls before they ever got to the end-user. Companies and government agencies whose numbers were frequently spoofed by robocall spammers would be registered on the list and if a phone company saw a call from one of these numbers originating from outside the US, that call would be blocked at the source.

In the blog post, AT&T affirmed its commitment to work with other stakeholders on the list and the company stated that it would conform to emerging advanced caller ID verification standards.

Meanwhile, an FCC source confirmed to Consumerist the Stephenson was indeed asked by Wheeler to take charge of the Strike Force, though he was something of an odd choice given some of his recent statements on the issue.

In June, Stephenson said he hated robocalls just like everyone else, but that he needed the FCC's permission to deploy call-blocking technology, which was not true. AT&T later backtracked, and said the problem was that current robo-blockers left open the slim possibility of a legitimate call getting blocked.

Meanwhile, Tim  Marvin who heads the Consumer Union's End Robocalls campaign said  he was encouraged that Wheeler's letters appeared to be resulting in some action by the telecom industry.

''But consumers need more than just another set of vague promises from companies like AT&T about future solutions,'' cautions Marvin. ''AT&T should take advantage of existing technologies and offer their customers free call-blocking tools now, '' Consumerist reported.