T-Mobile says it blocked 21B scam calls this year

Hi, I previously served as CTO of the FCC&#x27;s Enforcement Bureau, where I worked on then-Chairman Wheeler&#x27;s Robocall Strike Force. I&#x27;d like to offer a few observations that might be of interest.<p>* T-Mobile, like the other carriers, is offering a numerator and not a denominator. These call filtering services are plainly valuable, but it&#x27;s difficult to evaluate how effective they are based on current public evidence.<p>* It isn&#x27;t a coincidence that the top robocall destinations include locations that are popular for retirement. These scams disproportionately target and take advantage of older customers.<p>* Call authentication (STIR&#x2F;SHAKEN) is helping, and will continue to become more effective. The FCC did not push carriers to rapidly adopt call authentication during the last administration; Congress eventually stepped in with the TRACED Act, and the FCC has since made STIR&#x2F;SHAKEN a top priority.

The phone system is a perfect example of why literally nobody other than a few tech purists wants federated communications systems. It astounds me how many still cling to what (IMHO) is an unworkable ideal.<p>The only thing that has made email remotely usable is that the service is concentrated in a few providers who spent a huge amount of effort to minimize the spam.<p>It&#x27;s classic tragedy of the commons.<p>Obviously we don&#x27;t have authenticated caller identity in the phone system and you can argue that would solve the problem of spam. No argument it would help but I very much doubt it would solve it.<p>For awhile you were able to IM Gmail users from outside Gmail (through XMPP). This was unsurprisingly shut down because the likes of Microsoft (Hotmail) didn&#x27;t reciprocate (ie Hotmail users could message Gmail users but not the other way around).<p>Spam on phone networks continues because bad actors profit from it. For example, spam traffic is &quot;laundered&quot; with legitimate traffic so the exchange itself isn&#x27;t blocked by other parties. It also gives plausible deniability.<p>These things are all inevitable consequences of federated communications systems.

Spam Callers must be identified and banned (preferably) by a global task force that is funded both by the cellular service providers and the governments.<p>This is a global problem and no single country or company can be expected to fix it on their own.

I was with T-Mobile until three months ago. I used their Scam Shield service - the app is still actually still on my iPhone.<p>I received about 25 calls per day on average that slipped right through their service.<p>Senior health coverage, car warranty, etc calls. All using spoofed caller ID. All using the same technique of call screeners in India or similar that then forward the calls to US companies buying the leads. I actually had a conversation with a U.S. based insurance agent that was buying the leads and told her of the spoofing and other shady techniques they use. Her response was, “They supply good leads so I keep buying them.”<p>Anyway, I switched to Verizon and it is no better. I ended up setting my phone in Focus mode 24x7 and whitelisted almost my whole contact list. It was either that or change my phone number. Can’t concentrate on work when you’re being called every 20-30 minutes.

Well its all obvious now; each carrier has their own &quot;SUPERspamGuard!®&quot; so there is little incentive to fix the problem anymore. It is just another selling point to get customers who are fed up with their previous provider.<p>We need to fine companies that continue to route these calls. It is not like tracing is impossible.

Fun little fact: Not a single one blocked was an auto-warranty call to my phone though.

Interestingly, my mechanic sends invoice links over text. Mine didn&#x27;t come through so they asked if I had TMobile.<p>Turns out, T-Mobile charges businesses a fee (I want to say they said something like $250&#x2F;mo?) to allow messages through even though I opted in and wanted this communication.<p>Seems a little bit like they introduced a &quot;solution&quot; but then can simply charge to profit off letting people through the solution?

I really thought rolling out STIR&#x2F;SHAKEN was going to fix this problem. I don&#x27;t notice any difference. If anything, I&#x27;m getting more robocalls now.

It makes me feel old to realize that I grew up in a time when, if the phone rang, you could pick it without hesitation because the other person on the line was a genuine caller. Things don&#x27;t always improve with time.

Realistically every carrier should be doing this.<p>I have no idea why I&#x27;m even allowed to get calls from V11109011700119 on my cellphone. They&#x27;re so clearly scams &#x2F; spam that every carrier globally should close these down.

Unfortunately, only the basic detection works when you&#x27;re on prepaid. The calls will come in, but you&#x27;ll at least be warned. No, I&#x27;m not going postpaid, especially given their history of data breaches.<p>Still, I like seeing &quot;Scam Likely&quot; when a robocall comes in. Too bad they insist on engaging my voicemail - my least time-wasting option is to just pick up the call and immediately hang up. I&#x27;m extremely lucky that my cell phone gets only a few of these a week, but that&#x27;s annoying enough.

Should we be impressed? This shouldn&#x27;t even be measured. How many <i>didn&#x27;t</i> they block? Can we start blaming carriers for not blocking?

There&#x27;s one call I get once a month or so that&#x27;s a pretty convincing robot. It&#x27;s a guy asking for donations for some sort of police association. It seems to try to use the robot to gauge interest, then sends you to a real person if you say the right things. They don&#x27;t change the pitch script at all, though, so I recognize it in the first few words now.

I&#x27;m thankful my phone number&#x27;s area code is from a different part of the country. All the spoofers use the old area code thinking they are tricking me into picking up. But I know that no one from where I lived in 2006 is calling me.

These companies should open source the spam filter. Let mission driven developers deal with spam filters.

Censorship! &#x2F;s