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NAFCU, trades comment on FCC call blocking order and notice of proposed rulemaking
NAFCU, along with several trade associations, Wednesday submitted comments on the Federal Communications Commission’s (FCC) further notice of proposed rulemaking aimed at reducing harmful, illegal robocalls while minimizing the blocking and mislabeling of legitimate calls.
NAFCU supports the FCC’s efforts to address these issues but cautions that enforcement actions and burdensome regulations should not prevent credit unions from trying to relay important information to their members.
The trades urged the FCC to avoid imposing excessive restrictions on providers that originate and transmit “non-conversational traffic” such as legitimate fraud alerts and payment reminders. Holding providers strictly liable to this restriction would lead to “even more aggressive blocking, declining to serve customers that generate non-conversational traffic, or increasing service costs to offset increased regulatory and litigation risks in carrying this traffic.”
Of note, the trades encouraged the FCC to identify other ways to curb illegal spoofing, such as requiring voice service providers using non-IP networks to authenticate caller ID using technologies such as the STIR/SHAKEN framework.
In addition, the trades underscored that, in light of legitimate cases of originating calls outside the U.S. with U.S. numbers, the FCC should move cautiously before imposing further restrictions on the use of U.S. numbers for foreign-originated calls.
NAFCU and several trades last month met with FCC staff in Chairwoman Rosenworcel’s office to review the Alliance for Telecommunications Industry Solutions (ATIS) Session Initiation Protocol (SIP) Forum NNI Task Force’s efforts to develop an enhanced version of SIP Code 603. NAFCU has asked for additional clarity when callers receive a SIP CODE 603 notification, since the notice offers very little detail on why the calls were blocked, who chose to block the call (the recipient or the carrier), and what can be done to mitigate it being marked as unlawful for the future.
Read the letter. NAFCU continues to advocate for additional clarity and guidance to help credit unions better reach their members.