this post was submitted on 02 Feb 2024
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Robocalls with AI voices to be regulated under Telephone Consumer Protection Act, the agency says. I'm pretty sure this puts us on the timeline where we eventually get incredible, futuristic tech, but computers and robots still sound mechanical and fake.

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[–] [email protected] 5 points 9 months ago* (last edited 9 months ago) (1 children)

Does this include google assistant making robocalls or answering my phone on my behalf? I sometimes use it to setup hair cut appointments.

[–] [email protected] 4 points 9 months ago

Wait you can use Google Assistant to make calls? I just use it to filter out spam calls without answering.

[–] [email protected] 58 points 9 months ago (1 children)

Let's just make robo calls illegal ok?

[–] [email protected] 27 points 9 months ago (1 children)
[–] [email protected] 2 points 9 months ago* (last edited 9 months ago)

All these calls are coming from India and their government just do not give a shit. As they are all massively corrupt.

[–] [email protected] 9 points 9 months ago (1 children)
[–] [email protected] 3 points 9 months ago

Ngl, it's hard to get down a mountain on those things...

[–] [email protected] 53 points 9 months ago (3 children)

OK. Enforce it then.

Block all calls unless you can verify exactly who they're from. Block all overseas VOIP bullshit. Block calls from any country that doesn't have the same call verification rules.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 9 months ago

Seems you could do all of that easily enough with asterisk or any of its variants/frontends. Bonus, you can tweak the rules as you like, on the fly.

For awhile I was getting obv scam calls from china - I neither know anyone there nor do business of any kind there. That country code would be one of the first on my blacklist.

[–] [email protected] 13 points 9 months ago

Blame the Republicans in Congress.

It took until last May for the Senate to finally confirm the fifth Commissioner. Per law, they can't create new rules or regulations when there's a vacancy.

Have you noticed that 5G was getting faster and had more coverage until it more or less stopped last year? For the first time in history, Congress did not renew the FCC's spectrum auction authority. T-Mobile bought a lot of 2.5Ghz spectrum back in 2022 but the FCC couldn't grant it to them. It wasn't until a month and a half ago that they could use it... Because Congress passed a bill that granted the authority for auctions held prior to March 2023.

They've also tried going after the VOIP services that don't follow STIR/SHAKEN or allow robocallers. But they don't have enough funding to do much more than the minimum. For the very few that they can catch, they first provide a warning period for the company to remove robocallers and correct their systems. If that fails, the FCC then permits carriers to block the provider, but they can't mandate it.

Except even that's not enough. The FCC can't take actual legal action against the providers, only the robocallers. So quite often, the provider will just change their business name, list different fake people as their executives, and then rejoin the networks as if nothing ever happened. Look up One Owl Telecom - they've done this numerous times.

[–] [email protected] 4 points 9 months ago

But its too hard to implement! Give us money! (telecoms probably)

[–] [email protected] 25 points 9 months ago* (last edited 9 months ago) (2 children)

How about this: if I get a robocall advertising a product/service or a politician's campaign I get that product or service for FREE and if it's for a politician they lose $25k from their pac or Superfund for each report (which gets donated to their opponent)?

[–] [email protected] 9 points 9 months ago (1 children)

yeah then you'll have even more GOC money funding fake "Democratic Party" robocalls.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 9 months ago* (last edited 9 months ago)

Yea except if we have a publishable reporting system (for robocalls, like the ones you're making up rn) it won't work like that will it? Being that the concept changes the status quo... This isn't super difficult to figure out if you try ;)

[–] [email protected] 2 points 9 months ago (1 children)

There are more than 2 parties.

[–] [email protected] 5 points 9 months ago* (last edited 9 months ago) (1 children)

Sounds like a semantic debate. Yes, third parties exist but they don't get enough votes to win in a FPTP voting system.

I'll concede if you can show me where a third party has won a POTUS spot in the last 60 years.Sadly the history tells a different story.

Maybe the 25k can just go to me as a victim, then.

[–] [email protected] -1 points 9 months ago (1 children)

How do they donate the vote to "their opponent" when you agree there are more than one?

[–] [email protected] 5 points 9 months ago* (last edited 9 months ago)

Divide it up amongst them all? Is it that hard?

Is this entire thread just semantic debates over my opinions or what lmao

The idea of this being a 'punishment' isn't from the direct loss of financial support, but the aid to opponents. It doesn't matter who it goes to as long as it isn't the one using robocalls to canvas voters.

Do you think I'd get 10-15 GOP funding texts and calls a week if each one was a chance for me to use their funds to help their opponents? I don't.

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