3B

“Congratulations, you won!” have become 
words to fear in the age of robocalls. Nearly 
every cell phone owner is familiar with the 
feeling of answering what looks like a local 
number, but hearing a cold, robotic voice 
awarding us a free Hawaiian cruise, or 
warning us of a vendetta from the IRS.
When taken for face value, robocalls seem 
to exist for the sole purpose of malicious 
irritation, but a closer look reveals that they 
have slithered their way underneath the 
innocuous umbrella of direct marketing, 
becoming 
the 
evil 
stepbrother 
of 
advertisement catalogs and emails.
While direct marketing is governed under 
three levels of regulation (federal, state and 
local), there is a thin line to cross before 
abusing the luxury of direct marketing — 
thin enough for businesses to have to consult 
attorneys just to engage in legitimate direct 
marketing practices, such as delivering sales 
pitches through mail, phone or email.
Robocalls have been a source of nuisance, 
deception and con artists for decades. In 
1991, the federal government passed the 
Telephone Consumer Protection Act to 
regulate telemarketers and attempt to 
terminate fraudulent activity. It prohibited 
solicitation by autodialers, unsolicited fax 
marketing, calls before 8 a.m. and after 9 
p.m., and calls to those who have indicated 
they would not like to be called again. The 
Federal 
Communications 
Commission 
does not award mercy to those who violate 
the TCPA. Last year, the FCC slapped a 
$120 million fine on Adrian Abramovich 
of Miami, who flooded consumers with 97 
million phone calls promoting illegitimate 
travel deals using an autodialer. It was the 
largest fine to date.
But 
even 
more 
powerful 
than 
the FCC’s newly found authority to 
regulate telemarketers is the consumer 
empowerment 
that 
came 
with 
the 
legislation: TCPA also gave consumers a 
way to personally pursue a case against a 
telemarketer that they believe has violated 
the law. An individual can earn up to $500 
per violation that they have experienced, 
and if caught by the FTC, telemarketers can 
be liable for $10,000 per violation. 
But being caught is a tough bet in the 
industry. Because small illegal operations 
either run on anonymity or are based 
overseas, tracking robocallers’ assets is 
one of the biggest pain points in trying to 
stop this fraudulent practice. Many times, 
operations are so small that, when fined, 
they are unable to even pay the full penalty. 
As of three weeks ago, the FCC announced 
that they have fined robocallers $208 
million, but have only been able to collect 
$6,790.
With the TCPA now being the No. 1 
lawsuit filed in the U.S., comedian John 
Oliver has a point: Hatred of robocalls may 
just be “the only thing everyone in America 
agrees on.” But the problem is only getting 

worse. According to Robocall Index, 
there are roughly 170 million robocalls 
made per day, and it continues on an 
incline. Mobile scam calls made up 
3.7 percent of total calls in 2017, 29.2 
percent in 2018, and that number is 
now projected to reach roughly 45 
percent before the end of this year.
But robocalls are not solely used 
for deception: We rely on automated 
calls from our hospitals and dentists 
reminding 
us 
of 
appointments, 
pharmacies 
notifying 
us 
about 
medication refills, school districts 
announcing snow days and banks 
alerting us of fraud. And while 
federal law requires that companies 
cannot conduct robocalls without 
giving consent, most of us have opted 
into them without realizing it — in 
the lengthy terms of service box 
we habitually check before using a 
product or service. 
Nevertheless, the robocall ratio 
of necessary to unnecessary is 
remarkably lopsided. In the pursuit 
to combat robocalls and profit, 
cell phone providers (e.g. AT&T, 
Verizon Wireless) and third party 
apps (e.g. Nomorobo, Hiya) are 
charging monthly fees to help fend off 
robocallers. They detect repeating-
digit numbers (i.e. 222-222-2222), 
numbers with more than 10 digits, 
and, the latest tactic, neighborhood 
spoofing: 
suspiciously 
similar 
phone 
numbers to those of our neighbors.
The 
annoyance 
of 
robocalls 
has 
expanded to our inboxes with the rise of 
email. In 2003, the federal government 
also cracked down on unsolicited emails 
by passing legislation called “Controlling 
the Assault of Non-Solicited Pornography 
and Marketing Act,” or CAN-SPAM. While 
the government was originally relaxed 
about email marketing due to its free 
receipt, easy discarding and legalphysical 
mailbox spam, it began cracking down on 
misleading emails, demanding only truthful 
and straightforward content in order to 
prevent spam from turning to scam. That 
same year, robo regulation continued as the 
government established a national Do Not 
Call registry.
Despite more entities cracking down 
and more legislation being passed, the fact 
of the matter is that becoming a robocaller 
and getting away with it is fairly simple. 
Downloading 
software 
only 
requires 
internet access and a computer, and the cost 
is typically less than a penny per call.
And while scammers can see windfalls 
when consumers naively fork over their 
credit card numbers to purchase illegitimate 
services, they can also make incremental 
income just by calling phone numbers that 
provide caller ID. These IDs originate from 
databases that try to identify who is calling, 

and when a caller’s name is displayed, phone 
companies pay small fees to databases 
that store the names, and occasionally to 
the caller himself as well. These fees can 
sometimes even be enough to offset the cost 
of making the calls in the first place.
While we can appreciate the government’s 
endeavors to double down on this issue, 
there is another layer of complexity to 
consider: the honest victims who get caught 
in the fishnet.
Since the TCPA is what’s called a strict 
liability statute, one harmless mistake 
can result in a violation — no exceptions. 
And since 100,000 phone numbers are 
reassigned every day, it isn’t hard for well-
intentioned companies to accidentally call 
the “wrong person,” or rather, the new 
owner of a subscribing phone number. If the 
new call recipient brings the call to court, it 
could cost the company.
Three weeks ago, Roger Meiners, a 
professor at University of Texas-Arlington, 
proposed a novel solution that quickly 
gained traction online: the “Penny for 
Sanity Tax” or a 1-cent tax on every call 
made. The five billion robocalls made this 
past year would cost $50 million — a notable 
government incentive to act. Because 
targeting individual robocallers is virtually 
impossible, the tax would apply to all calls 
to affect any caller in the U.S., robo or 
real. Because society is moving away from 
frequent calling, the tax would hardly affect 

common man’s wallet. The average adult 
makes six calls a day, meaning a mere $1.80 
a month. Once you get past the idea of yet 
another tax, this could be our silver bullet.
While the FCC works day and night to 
combat this incessant issue, it came to a 
head last week when federal investigators 
unearthed Operation Brace Yourself, one of 
the biggest health care scams in U.S. history, 
amounting to $1.2 billion. The Department 
of Justice has charged 24 people from New 
Jersey to California after telemarketers 
in the Philippines and Latin America 
advertised “free” orthopedic braces to 
those newly eligible for Medicare in the U.S. 
Doctors deliberately wrote prescriptions for 
braces that patients never asked for, and sold 
the prescriptions to brace manufacturers 
who then billed Medicare anywhere $500 
to $900 for each brace. After processing, 
doctors were given kickbacks of roughly 
$300 per brace. Needless to say, it did not 
pay off.
Whether it’s through the Penny for 
Sanity Tax or another round of legislation, 
robocalls may remain the FCC’s top priority 
for a while.
You can protect yourself from robocalls 
by signing up your mobile phone on the Do 
Not Call Registry at www.donotcall.gov, 
and refraining from answering any phone 
number that mimics the first 4-6 digits of 
your phone number.

Wednesday, April 17, 2019 // The Statement 
3B

BY ROMY SHARMA, STATEMENT COLUMNIST
The business case for robocalls

ILLUSTRATION BY CHRISTINE JEGARL

