AG Tim Fox Urges Congress to take Action against Robocalls

Anytime of the day or night your phone can ring and on the other line is another aggravating robocall.

Montana Attorney General Tim Fox urged the U.S. Senate on Tuesday to enact the Telephone Robocall Abuse Criminal Enforcement and Deterrence (TRACED) Act, legislation to curb illegal robocalls and spoofing, according to spokesman John Barnes.

“According to the Federal Trade Commission and Federal Communications Commission in 2018 there were more than 48 billion robocalls made throughout the country,” said Barnes. “There’s a piece of legislation, one of those wonderful government acronyms called the Traced Act, which stands for Telephone Robocall Abuse Criminal Enforcement and Deterrence Act.”

Barnes described Attorney General Fox’s action on the bill.

“Attorney General Tim Fox and a number of other attorneys general wrote to the committee and urged them to move this legislation forward and get it passed,” he said. “It does a couple of things. It would require voice service providers to participate in a call authentication framework to help block unwanted calls. It also creates an interagency working group with other state attorneys general and have consumer protection responsibilities to help reduce these unwanted robocalls and hold telemarketers responsible for these calls.”

A coalition of 54 attorneys general sent a letter to the U. S. Senate Committee on Commerce, Science, and Transportation supporting the TRACED Act.  Fox was joined by the attorneys general of all other states, the District of Columbia, Guam, Puerto Rico, and the Virgin Islands.