[Senate Hearing 114-861]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office]




                                                        S. Hrg. 114-861
 
                         RINGING OFF THE HOOK:
                      EXAMINING THE PROLIFERATION
                           OF UNWANTED CALLS

=======================================================================

                                HEARING

                               BEFORE THE

                       SPECIAL COMMITTEE ON AGING

                          UNITED STATES SENATE

                    ONE HUNDRED FOURTEENTH CONGRESS


                             FIRST SESSION

                               __________

                             WASHINGTON, DC

                               __________

                             JUNE 10, 2015

                               __________

                           Serial No. 114-07

         Printed for the use of the Special Committee on Aging
         
         
         
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        Available via the World Wide Web: http://www.govinfo.gov
        
        
        
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              U.S. GOVERNMENT PUBLISHING OFFICE 
49-416 PDF              WASHINGTON : 2022 
         
        
        
                       SPECIAL COMMITTEE ON AGING

                   SUSAN M. COLLINS, Maine, Chairman

ORRIN G. HATCH, Utah                 CLAIRE McCASKILL, Missouri
MARK KIRK, Illinois                  BILL NELSON, Florida
JEFF FLAKE, Arizona                  ROBERT P. CASEY, JR., Pennsylvania
TIM SCOTT, South Carolina            SHELDON WHITEHOUSE, Rhode Island
BOB CORKER, Tennessee                KIRSTEN E. GILLIBRAND, New York
DEAN HELLER, Nevada                  RICHARD BLUMENTHAL, Connecticut
TOM COTTON, Arkansas                 JOE DONNELLY, Indiana
DAVID PERDUE, Georgia                ELIZABETH WARREN, Massachusetts
THOM TILLIS, North Carolina          TIM KAINE, Virginia
BEN SASSE, Nebraska
                              ----------                              
               Priscilla Hanley, Majority Staff Director
                 Derron Parks, Minority Staff Director
                 
                         C  O  N  T  E  N  T  S

                              ----------                              

                                                                   Page

Opening Statement of Senator Susan M. Collins, Chairman..........     1
Opening Statement of Senator Claire McCaskill, Ranking Member....     3

                           PANEL OF WITNESSES

Linda Blase, Proprietor, Linda Blase Photography and Design, and 
  Recipient of Spoofed Calls and Robocalls.......................     5
Henning Schulzrinne, Levi Professor of Computer Science and 
  Electrical Engineering, Columbia University....................     6
Lois Greisman, Associate Director, Division of Marketing 
  Practices, Bureau of Consumer Protection, U.S. Federal Trade 
  Commission.....................................................     8
Joe Dandurand, Deputy Attorney General, State of Missouri........    10

                                APPENDIX
                      Prepared Witness Statements

Linda Blase, Proprietor, Linda Blase Photography and Design, and 
  Recipient of Spoofed Calls and Robocalls.......................    29
Henning Schulzrinne, Levi Professor of Computer Science and 
  Electrical Engineering, Columbia University....................    32
Lois Greisman, Associate Director, Division of Marketing 
  Practices, Bureau of Consumer Protection, U.S. Federal Trade 
  Commission.....................................................    39
Joe Dandurand, Deputy Attorney General, State of Missouri........    59

                       Statements for the Record

Exhibit A: Letter from the National Association of Attorneys 
  General, dated September 9, 2014...............................    69
Exhibit B: 2015 News Archive Regarding Phone Companies Blocking 
  Telemarketing Calls............................................    74


                         RINGING OFF THE HOOK:

                      EXAMINING THE PROLIFERATION

                           OF UNWANTED CALLS

                              ----------                              


                        WEDNESDAY, JUNE 10, 2015

                                       U.S. Senate,
                                Special Committee on Aging,
                                                    Washington, DC.
    The Committee met, pursuant to notice, at 2:32 p.m., Room 
562, Dirksen Senate Office Building, Hon. Susan M. Collins, 
Chairman of the Committee, presiding.
    Present: Senators Collins, Heller, Tillis, McCaskill, 
Casey, Blumenthal, Donnelly, and Kaine.

                 OPENING STATEMENT OF SENATOR 
                   SUSAN M. COLLINS, CHAIRMAN

    The Chairman. Good afternoon. When Congress passed 
legislation creating the National Do Not Call Registry in 2003, 
we thought we had put an end to the plague of unwelcome 
telemarketers who were interrupting Americans morning, noon, 
and night, but now, nearly 12 years later, phones are once 
again ringing off the hook. In this hearing, we will look at 
why Americans who have signed up for the Do Not Call Registry 
are still getting unwanted phone calls and what can be done to 
stop it.
    We will see that a large part of the problem traces to the 
fact that the regulatory framework behind the Do Not Call List 
has been rendered ineffective by advances in technology. It 
used to be that phone calls were routed through equipment that 
was costly and complicated to operate. High-volume calling was 
difficult and expensive, especially for international calls. 
That old equipment could not be used easily to disguise or 
spoof a caller ID.
    Now, phone calls can be routed from anywhere in the world 
at practically no cost. This can be done by using so-called 
Voice over Internet Protocol technology, or VoIP, and the 
computer programs needed to generate these calls are remarkably 
inexpensive and easy to use.
    Now, reputable telemarketers scrub their calling list 
against a data base to make sure that they do not dial numbers 
belonging to consumers who have signed up for the Do Not Call 
List. If you are on that list, there is a good chance that the 
telemarketer who is calling you is not legitimate. Instead, it 
could well be a scam artist using a computer programmed to 
generate robocalls. These robocalls typically originate 
offshore, often from call centers in India, but you would not 
know that fact from looking at your caller ID, because the 
scammers spoof their caller ID to add credibility and hide 
their true location.
    As we learned in our recent hearing on the IRS scam, 
fraudsters can even spoof their numbers to make victims believe 
that they are calling from the IRS or local law enforcement. 
When these unsuspecting victims see the Internal Revenue 
Service or their local police department pop up on their caller 
ID screen, they are worried, scared, and often easily hustled 
into doing whatever the scammers demand.
    Simply put, spoofing is very easy, as I will now 
demonstrate.
    [Telephone ringing.]
    The Chairman. My screen is reading, ``Internal Revenue 
Service,'' but let us see. Hello, this is Susan Collins. May I 
ask who is calling?
    Mr. Dewey. Hello, Chairman Collins. This is Sam Dewey from 
your staff.
    The Chairman. Sam, my phone says that you are calling from 
the IRS headquarters number, which is 202-622-5000. Are you 
calling from the IRS?
    Mr. Dewey. No, Senator, I am actually over here.
    The Chairman. There you have it. Thank you, Sam.
    Here is what the number would look like on a standard 
landline phone, where you have the screen where your caller ID 
shows up.
    Now, the IRS, of course, is part of the Department of 
Treasury. My staff was able to spoof that number using a free 
iPhone app right here in this hearing room, and looking at my 
phone, I would have no way of knowing that it was not really 
the IRS or the Department of Treasury calling me.
    Obviously, these fraudsters have no intention of following 
U.S. law. In fact, they may use the Do Not Call List as a 
source of working numbers in their hunt for new victims. If we 
are going to win the fight against scammers targeting our 
seniors, we need to get ahead of the technology that they use 
to generate robocalls and to spoof caller IDs.
    [Telephone ringing.]
    Let us see who this one is. Hello, this is Susan Collins.
    Mr. Dewey. Hello, Senator Collins. It is Sam Dewey from 
your staff again.
    The Chairman. Sam, this is getting old. [Laughter.]
    This time, Sam is pretending to be from the Department of 
Justice, and he has just demonstrated how easy it is to spoof 
multiple phone numbers, not just the IRS, the Department of 
Justice, and virtually any other official sounding number, and 
he has also demonstrated just how annoying these repeated calls 
can be to the consumer, so Sam, I am turning off my ringer now.
    This is a serious problem. It would be one thing if the 
real number were showing up on the hard line ID screen. Then 
callers might have some chance of protecting themselves by 
simply not answering the phone, as we have advised in many of 
our hearings, but when you see the IRS or your local police 
department's number, or the FBI's number showing up on your 
screen, you are going to answer that call.
    I wish that Senator McCaskill were here right now. She will 
be coming----
    Senator McCaskill. I am here.
    The Chairman. You managed to miss my very exciting opening 
statement, which had two spoofed calls during it.
    Senator McCaskill. Oh, darn.
    The Chairman. You are here for the praise part of the 
hearing, and I do want to salute you for the work that you have 
done on the Commerce Committee on this issue and for the 
legislation that you have drafted, which I am very pleased to 
join you in cosponsoring, so before we turn to our witnesses 
whose testimony I am very much looking forward to, I now would 
like to call on our Ranking Member to deliver her statement.

                 OPENING STATEMENT OF SENATOR 
                CLAIRE McCASKILL, RANKING MEMBER

    Senator McCaskill. First, my most sincere apologies. You 
know, this place is--all my colleagues will attest to the fact 
that all best plans get blown up by crises of schedule, so I 
apologize for being a few minutes late and I apologize for 
missing your opening statement.
    Thank you so much, Chairman Collins, for holding this 
hearing. This is a topic I am very concerned about and, 
frankly, I think anybody who--and I know the witnesses here 
from the Missouri Attorney General's Office can speak to this--
if there is one topic that comes up frequently with Missourians 
when I am talking to them, it really is, ``Can you not do 
anything about the robocalls? I am on the Do Not Call List. Why 
can you not get them to stop?''
    I watched my mother get victimized when she thought she was 
being called by Medicare and it was really a company called Med 
Care that was robocalling her and lying to her about whether or 
not they had talked to her doctor.
    In our 2013 subcommittee hearing in the Commerce Committee, 
we heard about the inability of enforcement agencies to keep up 
with this game of whack-a-mole that phone scams have become, 
and pleas for help from consumers, that their providers please 
help them by offering technologies that will block unwanted and 
fraudulent calls.
    I have been tough on the phone companies, not because they 
are causing the problem, but rather because they are in the 
best position to do something about it. Some innovators have 
made great strides in developing call-blocking technologies. 
However, to my frustration, industry representatives have 
continued to insist that the law does not allow them to do 
this. That does not work.
    I was not the only one seeking clarity here. Missouri's 
Attorney General, Chris Koster, a Democrat, along with 
Indiana's Republican Attorney General, spearheaded a letter to 
the FCC and 37 other Attorneys General signed on. They wanted a 
formal opinion that clarified whether what we were hearing from 
industry was true, that their hands were tied about their 
ability to provide call-blocking technology based on consumer 
choice.
    I am pleased today that we are joined by Missouri's Deputy 
Attorney General, former Judge Joe Dandurand, to explain why 
giving consumers more power and choice in which calls they 
receive is such an important concern for law enforcement 
nationwide.
    I am also pleased that FCC Commissioner Wheeler has heard 
concerns coming from Capitol Hill and across the country and 
recently announced a proposal to be considered at the 
Commission later this month that would allow telecommunications 
providers to offer consumers technology tools to combat 
unwanted calls. This proposal will be voted on next week at the 
FCC, and I am strongly encouraging the FCC to adopt Chairman 
Wheeler's proposal.
    I am grateful that the FCC has used its existing authority 
to modernize its rules. However, I also recognize that in some 
cases, statutory changes must be made to keep up with rapidly 
evolving technology. To that end, this week, I have introduced 
and am very pleased to have cosponsorship with the chairman of 
this Committee, Chairman Collins. We introduced together the 
Robocall and Call Spoofing Enforcement Improvement Act. This 
bill would give the FCC more enforcement authority, allowing it 
to go after non-licensed robocall violators and increasing 
penalties on them.
    One of the other concerns we have heard from our law 
enforcement agencies is their inability to get at spammers who 
spoof calls from overseas. This bill would allow for the FCC to 
enforce our spoofing laws against overseas callers who direct 
their activities to those living in the United States.
    Additionally, the bill would grant the FCC explicit 
authority to regulate third-party spoofing services.
    We have to stay on top of this issue because spammers, 
spoofers, and robocallers will continue to use whatever tools 
are available to them to defraud American consumers and 
America's seniors. We must give them the flexibility to fight 
these fraudsters. The complaints are only increasing. In the 
last five years alone, the FTC reports monthly complaints about 
illegal robocalls have doubled.
    In Missouri, as we will hear from Attorney General 
Dandurand, the top complaint of residents is unwanted and 
illegal telemarketing calls. It is not even close. His office 
gets 50 times the number of complaints for those calls than it 
did for the next highest category of complaint.
    We can do this. Together, we can do this. I look forward to 
hearing the testimony from this panel and exploring more ways 
to help consumers fight these unwanted calls.
    Thank you, and I look forward to all of your testimony.
    The Chairman. Thank you very much for your statement.
    I would note that we have been joined by Senator Heller, 
Senator Casey, and Senator Kaine, and I know that others of our 
colleagues will be joining us as their schedules permit.
    We now turn to our panel of witnesses. First, we will hear 
from Linda Blase, a lighting designer and photographer from 
Dallas, Texas. She will tell us about the constant barrage of 
unwanted telemarketing calls she has received despite 
registering with the Do Not Call List.
    Second, we will hear from Professor Henning Schulzrinne 
from Columbia University in New York. The professor will 
explain the technology and describe the work that he is doing 
with the industry standards setting groups.
    Third, we will hear from Ms. Lois Greisman, who is the 
Associate Director of the Division of Marketing Practices in 
the Bureau of Consumer Protection at the Federal Trade 
Commission.
    Finally, we will hear from Joe Dandurand, who is the Deputy 
Attorney General in Missouri.
    I want to thank all of you for joining us, and we will 
start with you, Ms. Blase.

             STATEMENT OF LINDA BLASE, PROPRIETOR,

            LINDA BLASE PHOTOGRAPHY AND DESIGN, AND

            RECIPIENT OF SPOOFED CALLS AND ROBOCALLS

    Ms. Blase. Chairman Collins, Ranking Member McCaskill, and 
members of the Committee, thank you for giving me the 
opportunity to speak for thousands of American citizens who 
constantly receive unwanted telephone solicitations.
    As a small business owner working out of my home, my phone 
number has also found its way to telemarketers who target 
business. I know there are more critical issues to address in 
today's world, but there are few that affect as many of us on a 
daily basis as the barrage of robocalls that constantly 
interrupt our lives.
    In addition to scammers posing as the IRS and the FBI, 
trying to steal my savings, I have been bombarded by unwanted 
and irrelevant sales calls. I have had telemarketers tell me 
that my credit card processor is not in compliance with 
government regulations and their company needs to come upgrade 
it immediately, as if I ever had a credit card processor.
    One tried to sell me an ATM. Maybe I could put it in my 
living room.
    Several had important information about my credit card 
account, adding that there is no problem right now, but this is 
my last chance for them to lower my interest rate. If only that 
were true. I have been getting these calls for years, and then 
there is the man who starts out with, ``Hello, seniors,'' and 
then tries to sell me a device that calls for help if I fall. 
Oh, and by the way, someone has already paid to set it up for 
me, about a dozen times.
    These are just a few examples of the calls we are all 
getting every day.
    When the Do Not Call List was established, I immediately 
registered my phone number, but it soon became clear that it 
made no difference to these people. All they had to do was 
change a number or spoof one to hide their identities and evade 
prosecution, and that is assuming anyone was even willing to 
invest the time and energy required to do so, and with the 
proliferation of robocalls, it got even worse. If you actually 
speak to a human being and ask where the company got your phone 
number, if they do not hang up immediately, they will tell you 
they have no idea. They just get on the line after the computer 
has dialed your number and you answer the phone, and since toll 
free numbers apparently are not public record, telemarketers 
can hide their identities that way.
    I am reminded of the Borg mantra on Star Trek. Resistance 
is futile. There are too many ways these unethical people can 
invade our homes incessantly and with impunity, day in and day 
out.
    If you answer these calls or press one to speak to a sales 
rep, or press two to be taken off their list, you are just 
making matters worse. You have effectively told a computer that 
it has reached a working number. It also knows that you will 
answer calls from numbers you do not recognize, so not only 
will it continue to call you, your number may go on a list of 
targeted numbers which can be sold and resold many times to a 
multitude of telemarketers, robocallers, and scammers, so you 
have very few options. You can do a quick pick-up and hang-up 
without saying a word, or you cannot answer, giving the call a 
chance to go to voice mail, where you have to spend the time to 
retrieve and delete the number. You can report the numbers to 
the FCC using a detailed and time consuming online form, which 
I have done several times, or you can go to a consumer-driven 
website that collects complaints from others who are also 
tearing their hair out over these calls. It is all an exercise 
in futility.
    In search of a solution to the problem, I agreed to 
participate in a Consumers Union campaign against unwanted 
robocalls. I found that while call blockers can be useful 
straight out of the box, their effectiveness is limited, and to 
be fully functional may require additional and sometimes 
complicated programming, and my aging brain is looking for more 
simplicity, not more complication.
    It would be so much simpler if the phone companies could 
just block calls from their telemarketing clients to all 
numbers on the Do Not Call List, or to provide free robocall 
blocking tools to their residential and business customers, or 
both.
    As far as I am concerned, these calls are unwanted 
intrusions into my home, and scammers prey disproportionately 
on our elderly citizens. Why should telemarketers be exempt 
from regulations similar to the common requirement for door-to-
door salespersons to skip homes with a ``No Solicitors'' sign 
posted near the door? We need a similar mechanism for these 
unwanted phone calls. The National Do Not Call Registry was 
supposed to do this, but the technology used by the robocallers 
has made enforcement nearly impossible.
    I believe the telephone companies have the ability to do 
more in this area and that they should do so. We are certainly 
paying enough for their services. It is time for us all to take 
a good look at this issue and work together to stop or at least 
sharply decrease the number of these unwanted and fraudulent 
calls.
    Thank you for your time.
    The Chairman. Thank you very much for your testimony. When 
we get to questions, I am going to ask you about the robocall 
log that you kept for a month. I think it is very illuminating, 
the dozens of calls that you received and the variety of them.
    Professor, we look forward to hearing from you next.

             STATEMENT OF HENNING SCHULZRINNE, LEVI

          PROFESSOR OF COMPUTER SCIENCE AND ELECTRICAL

                ENGINEERING, COLUMBIA UNIVERSITY

    Mr. Schulzrinne. Thank you. Chairman Collins, Ranking 
Member McCaskill, and members of the Committee, thank you for 
the opportunity to appear before you today. My name is Henning 
Schulzrinne and I am the Levi Professor of Computer Science and 
Electrical Engineering at Columbia University in New York. I 
was the Chief Technology at the FCC from 2012 to 2014 and 
currently serve as a technology advisor to the FCC. I am 
pleased to join you to discuss technology issues and potential 
solutions surrounding robocalls and number spoofing. The views 
I express today are my own and do not necessarily reflect those 
of the FCC.
    Illegal and more general unwanted robocalls come in many 
flavors. We heard a few of those described in great detail 
already. All are annoying. Some are harassing, threatening, or 
deceptive. Beyond the well-known IRS and tech support scams, 
similar technology also facilitates swatting, that is, false 
911 calls claiming a crime in progress, or telephony denial of 
service attacks that interfere with the operation of nursing 
homes, hospitals, and other institutions.
    All of these, as distinct as they may seem, leverage the 
same three enablers: Cheap and anonymous international phone 
calls, as you mentioned; easy spoofing of a telephone number, 
whether it looks like a real number, like the IRS, or a law 
enforcement agency, or even complete nonexisting numbers that 
are used simply to obfuscate the origin; and fake or misleading 
caller name information.
    Fortunately, while new technologies have enabled the 
scourge of unwanted calls, emerging technologies can also help 
reduce and, I hope, eventually eliminate these calls. In my 
written testimony, I describe eight tools that are being 
developed. They are, however, reliant on three key concepts 
that I will outline now.
    First, we need to make caller ID information trustworthy 
again.
    Second, we need to provide traceable and reliable caller 
name information, and third, we need to let consumers and 
businesses decide which calls they want to receive and which 
ones they do not.
    These techniques, as different as they seem, attack 
unwanted calls by making it harder and more expensive for 
fraudulent callers to reach their marks and make it easier for 
enforcement authorities, such as the FCC and FTC and the State 
Attorney Generals, to locate and shut down these operations.
    Let me start on the first topic. First, to ensure that only 
entities authorized to use a telephone number can place calls 
using that number, the STIR working group within the Internet 
Engineering Task Force, known as IETF, is finishing up a set of 
specifications that allow legitimate originators of calls to 
cryptographically sign call set-up messages. I am helping that 
working group, as well.
    The technology is very similar to what is currently used to 
sign websites that are used by, for example, banks or other 
financial institutions. These techniques can be implemented as 
Voice over IP calls reach traditional phone networks, and thus, 
they can protect legacy networks even though we may not be able 
to upgrade those technologies themselves. Thus, they are able 
to protect both landline and mobile subscribers from fake 
caller ID information.
    However, I believe that even before we can implement 
cryptographic validation on a large scale, we can prevent the 
spoofing of numbers used by the kind of institutions 
mentioned--by banks, government offices such as the IRS, and 
social service agencies. I have called this approach the ``Do 
Not Originate List,'' as a rough equivalent to the Do Not Call 
Lists. Organizations who are likely to be impersonated by 
fraudsters would provide their numbers to operators of Voice 
over IP gateways, letting them know that no legitimate call 
would use those numbers. Gateway operators can then either 
remove or translate the bogus caller ID information. For 
example, all such calls with fake caller ID may then appear as 
area code 666.
    Second, Voice over IP technology allows making caller name 
information more reliable, as we no longer have to rely on a 
very short string derived from a third-party data base which 
can, indeed, be substituted with a similar looking name. A new 
working group within the same standardization organization has 
been proposed to modernize the delivery of caller name 
information.
    Third, and importantly, consumers and businesses need the 
technical ability to decide which calls to receive. They may 
either want a black list or white list. A black list designates 
numbers to be blocked, redirected to voice mail, or subject to 
a ``are you human'' test. These would be derived, for example, 
through crowdsourcing. A white list allows only certain numbers 
to reach, say, vulnerable individuals, while other calls are 
either blocked or forwarded to a family member or other trusted 
third parties.
    Importantly, such black lists and white lists can be 
implemented either by telephone providers themselves, or, if 
those providers cooperate, by making it possible by consumers' 
chosen third parties to vet phone calls, and these third 
parties can then compete on who does the best job of filtering 
out unwanted calls. This does, however, require that phone 
companies provide the suitable interfaces to do that.
    I appreciate your interest in this topic and I look forward 
to your questions on the technology. Thank you.
    The Chairman. Thank you very much, Professor. I very much 
appreciate your testimony.
    Ms. Greisman.

        STATEMENT OF LOIS GREISMAN, ASSOCIATE DIRECTOR,

           DIVISION OF MARKETING PRACTICES, BUREAU OF

       CONSUMER PROTECTION, U.S. FEDERAL TRADE COMMISSION

    Ms. Greisman. Thank you very much. Good afternoon, Chairman 
Collins, Ranking Member McCaskill, and members of the 
Committee. I am delighted to appear before you to discuss the 
FTC's work to fight illegal robocalls. I am also very pleased 
to be sitting next to Professor Schulzrinne, who has been a 
vital partner at the FTC--excuse me, at the FCC--with us.
    Tackling robocalls and curbing any unwanted telemarketing, 
particularly calls that target seniors, is a top priority for 
the FTC. Eleven years ago, the Commission established the Do 
Not Call Registry to create an easy-to-use tool for consumers 
to protect their privacy against unwanted calls. I do believe 
that program has been highly effective in reducing calls from 
legitimate telemarketers.
    Several years ago, as you referred to, Chairman Collins, 
the landscape started to shift in a very troubling way. 
Robocalls were on the rise. In 2009, the FTC received just a 
little more than 60,000 complaints about robocalls each month. 
Currently, we get approximately 150,000 complaints each month, 
a dramatic increase, so what happened?
    Major technological changes in telecommunications services 
have led to lower costs and improved services for consumers. 
That is good news, but unfortunately, fraudsters also have 
taken advantage of these same lower costs which brought faster 
and cheaper automated dialing platforms. Fraudsters, as we have 
heard already, have also further exploited caller ID spoofing, 
which induces the consumer to pick up the phone while enabling 
the scammer to hide anywhere in the world, hide its identity 
and location. In short, bad actors have taken advantage of this 
relatively cheap and scalable business model and used it to 
blast literally tens of millions of robocalls, illegal 
robocalls, over the course of one day at a cost of less than 
one cent per call.
    It is bad enough that these robocalls invade consumers' 
privacy and are illegal. Coupled with the illegal privacy 
invasion, however, we all too often see that the robocallers 
pitch goods and services riddled with fraud.
    The FTC continues to step up its law enforcement 
initiatives. For example, we have shut down a major robocall 
operation that ripped off seniors by telling them they were 
eligible to receive a free medical alert system bought for them 
by a family member or friend. Seniors who pressed one on a 
phone were transferred to a live operator, who said the medical 
alert device was approved by the American Heart Association or 
the American Diabetes Association. We allege those claims to be 
false. I think that is precisely the type of robocall that Ms. 
Blase referred to earlier, and I note that the State of Florida 
was a co-plaintiff in that case.
    In another recent case filed with ten State Attorneys 
General, including Missouri, Indiana, North Carolina, and 
again, Florida, the FTC sued the telemarketer, the lead 
generator that provided the names, the telephone numbers, and 
also the companies that helped the telemarketer spoof its 
caller ID to hide its identity. These entities were responsible 
for blasting billions of robocalls attempting to sell a cruise 
to the Bahamas.
    I do believe our coordination with State, Federal, and 
international partners is as strong as ever. As you know, while 
the FTC has no criminal enforcement authority, I am very happy 
to report that some of the individuals sued by the FTC for 
placing illegal robocalls have been prosecuted criminally by 
the Department of Justice.
    Still, we know law enforcement is not enough. We have 
committed to stimulating technological solutions by issuing no 
less than four challenges, challenging entrepreneurs to develop 
solutions, such as robocall blocking services that will zap 
``Rachel from cardholder services'' before she can invade our 
privacy and spew her lies. Our fourth contest takes place in 
August. It is entitled, ``Robocalls: Humanity Strikes Back.'' I 
think that title says it all.
    We think these contests have been very successful, as 
attested to by the fact that one of our winners of the very 
first contest brought his product, ``Nomorobo,'' to the 
marketplace just six months after winning. Nomorobo now has 
170,000 subscribers and reports to have blocked 24 million 
calls.
    With these challenges, and as detailed in the testimony, 
the FTC plays a leadership role to stimulate ongoing robust 
dialog with technical experts, academics, and industry groups, 
and I do want to underscore that our work is international in 
scope. In fact, members of the London Action Plan and the Voice 
and Telephony Abuse Special Interest Group are meeting in 
Dublin, Ireland, as we speak to tackle the consumer protection 
issues robocalls present.
    Finally, I want to assure you of our ongoing and sustained 
commitment to protect consumer privacy and halt telemarketing 
fraud by enforcing the Do Not Call Registry and by tackling 
illegal robocalls.
    I look forward to your questions. Thank you.
    The Chairman. Thank you for your testimony.
    Mr. Dandurand.

              STATEMENT OF JOE DANDURAND, DEPUTY 
              ATTORNEY GENERAL, STATE OF MISSOURI

    Mr. Dandurand. I take this opportunity on behalf of 
Attorney General Chris Koster to thank Chairman Senator Collins 
and my friend and Ranking Committee Member Senator Claire 
McCaskill and the Committee for inviting us here this 
afternoon, and going last, I apologize ahead of time for being 
a bit redundant. We have heard a lot of these things before.
    The Missouri Attorney General's office has a division 
dedicated entirely to responding to complaints from Missouri 
consumers. The Consumer Protection Division receives complaints 
about a wide variety of scams and frauds, such as illegal debt 
collecting practices and identity theft. However, the number 
one complaint by Missourians, as Senator McCaskill indicated, 
by a significant margin, is about unwanted and illegal 
telemarketing calls.
    In 2014, the vast majority of complaints our office 
received--of the well over 52,000 calls we received--were about 
illegal telemarketing. The next highest category of complaint 
was 1,200, just under 1,200.
    As in most states Missouri's No Call allows individuals who 
do not want to be called by telemarketers to register both 
their residential and their cell phone numbers on the No Call 
List.
    Every day, our No Call Unit receives complaints from 
people, many of whom are seniors, who have been abused or 
harassed by telemarketers who have no respect for the law or 
the privacy of those whom they victimize. Last month, our 
office received a complaint from an 80-year-old woman in St. 
Louis. She had received a call from someone telling her that 
she is eligible for a back brace paid for by Medicare. The 
caller was able to get the woman's Medicare identification 
number, which is her Social Security number and her date of 
birth. After hanging up the phone, she quickly realized that 
something was not right with that call and she notified our 
office.
    We also frequently receive complaints about robocalls, many 
of which specifically target seniors. For example, one recorded 
message making the rounds informs the senior consumer that he 
or she is eligible for a free medical alert bracelet if the 
senior will simply provide their identifying information.
    While some technologies, such as caller ID, help address 
unwanted calls, even then, technologies may be exploited. For 
example, caller ID spoofing happens when a caller deliberately 
falsifies the name and telephone number appearing on the caller 
ID information to disguise the caller's true identity, as you 
have seen Senator Collins be victimized here before we started 
today.
    One of the most frequent spoofing complaints our office 
receives from seniors is that their caller ID relays the 
letters ``SSI'' as the caller's identity. The seniors believe, 
of course, the call is coming from the Social Security 
Administration. However, upon answering the call, the consumer 
is immediately asked survey questions designed to illicit 
personal information.
    Our office is also fighting back in the courtroom. In 2014, 
we obtained more than $600,000 in judgments penalizing 
telemarketers for their illegal conduct, and significantly, our 
office also obtained court orders permanently prohibiting 28 
telemarketers from ever placing another call into the State of 
Missouri, but they are clever and they are relentless.
    Unfortunately, as Senator McCaskill told us a minute ago, 
it often becomes as frustrating as the old arcade game whack-a-
mole. We shut them down and they pop up again in other states 
or with different identities. Many have resorted to setting up 
shop and making calls from overseas locations, effectively 
nullifying our ability to obtain enforcement jurisdiction over 
them.
    This is a battle, however, which must be fought on many 
fronts. We need the help of private industry, including the 
telephone service providers, to help create solutions to help 
deter unwanted telemarketing calls.
    Already, as you know, technologies exist to reduce the 
number of robocalls to consumers' phones. These, ``call 
blockers'' filter incoming telemarketing calls before they 
reach the consumers' phones, thus dramatically reducing the 
number of unwanted calls a person receives.
    Yet, major phone carriers have resisted allowing the 
customers to have access to these call blocking technologies, 
claiming that Federal law prohibits it. To quite from a U.S. 
telecom rep at a July 10, 2013 Senate Subcommittee on Consumer 
Protection hearing, ``The current legal framework simply does 
not allow phone companies to decide for the consumer which 
calls should be allowed to go through and which calls should be 
blocked.''
    If so, then that should be changed. If that is the only 
thing stopping them, then by all means, we should clarify the 
law and give them such power. That is why last fall, Missouri 
Attorney General Chris Koster and Indiana Attorney General Greg 
Zoeller, with whom Senator Donnelly is certainly friends, 
joined by the 37 other Attorneys General that Senator McCaskill 
referenced before, penned and submitted a letter to the FCC, 
which is attached to my testimony as Exhibit A.
    We are thankful and encouraged by the fact that FCC 
Chairman Wheeler agrees. In response to the letter, Chairman 
Wheeler submitted a proposal to protect Americans from unwanted 
robocalls, spam text messages, and telemarketing calls, and it 
looks like the FCC will, in fact, provide clarity on the issue 
based on Chairman Wheeler's request. They are going to vote at 
the Commission's open meeting on June 18th.
    Our office is encouraged by the progress we have made, but 
we recognize the continuing challenges that need to be 
addressed. Consumers have made it clear that they are fed up 
with the number of unwanted telemarketing calls they receive. 
We must continue to research and employ newer technologies to 
help in our efforts to keep up with the illegal robocallers. 
The telephone carriers are in the unique position to help their 
own customers block these calls. Once the major carriers are on 
board, we can truly make a difference in the lives of consumers 
by giving them the power to stop the illegal telemarketing 
phone calls at their inception.
    While we do not share the industry's interpretation of the 
existing rule of law, to the extent that there is any ambiguity 
regarding the phone companies' legal authority to honor its 
customers' requests that they block these unwanted calls before 
they arrive, we would request clarity on that issue.
    Thank you again for the opportunity to briefly testify here 
today.
    The Chairman. Thank you very much for your testimony, as 
well.
    Ms. Blase, as I mentioned, you kept a robocall log that you 
shared with the Committee. It is extraordinary how many calls 
that you received. You were very precise about listing all of 
them, and that in many cases, you would get repeat calls. You 
would hang up and the person would call back again.
    I am curious whether you felt when you did answer some of 
these calls that the individuals had information about you that 
made the call more convincing and might be more persuasive to 
an individual who is less sophisticated than you are in dealing 
with these calls.
    Ms. Blase. Chairman Collins, the only time that I felt like 
they had information about me specifically was the business 
calls, because they got information somewhere that I have a 
business, so they assume I take credit cards, and they assume 
that I would have an ATM or would want to buy one for my 
business. I can only suspect that it came from the Sales and 
Use Tax Permit that I have to have in order to run my business 
or from a directory that is put out--a business directory that 
is put out.
    In fact, I have had a lot of trouble with that business 
directory sending me things every year saying, if you do not 
return this information confirming who you are or what you do 
or what you sell, we are going to have to drop you from the 
list, so I say, hooray, drop it, but every year, I get the same 
one, and they describe my business as something that it is 
nothing like, so I suspect that they are getting my number from 
that business list, which, I suspect, got it from the State, 
but I do not know that.
    The Chairman. Since not everyone has seen the call log that 
you put together over a month's time, could you describe in a 
little bit of detail the number of calls you received and the 
type of calls.
    Ms. Blase. Oh, gee. It is a big, long list, something like 
74 calls. I put that in my written testimony, but I did not 
count this up, and since I sent this to you, that same caller 
that called five times in one day when I did not answer has 
called me back another couple of times.
    The Chairman. This was just in a month's time.
    Ms. Blase. Yes. This is just one month's time. I started 
keeping this log on the 5th of May.
    The Chairman. And you are, I assume, registered on the Do 
Not Call List.
    Ms. Blase. Oh, yes.
    The Chairman. So you got more than 70 calls----
    Ms. Blase. Right.
    The Chairman. [continuing]. in a month's time----
    Ms. Blase. Yes.
    The Chairman. [continuing]. despite being on the list, 
which says something about the efficacy of the Do Not Call 
List.
    Professor, I understand that some commercial carriers are 
hesitant to offer robocall filters because of a concern that 
they cannot legally block a call under their common carrier 
obligations, and as has been discussed today, the FCC Chairman 
has released a proposal intended to clarify this legal issue--I 
gather there is dispute over the legal issue--and made clear 
that robocall filters are legal, so in the event that the FCC 
accepts the Chairman's proposal, are there robocall filters 
that are available now for consumers that could be put in place 
immediately by commercial carriers, by the telephone companies, 
to help protect consumers?
    Mr. Schulzrinne. Chairman Collins, there are three types of 
solutions that could be deployed either immediately or within a 
matter of months or short of a year. One, which was already 
mentioned, are third-party services that essentially rely on a 
specific feature called simultaneous ringing that some phone 
systems provide, and this is where Nomorobo solution, that 
allow the consumer to filter calls. That solution currently is 
only applicable to more modern phone systems, typically 
provided by the cable companies, Voice over IP companies, or 
some of the fiber-based phone services by the traditional phone 
companies.
    The second one which I see as particularly promising is 
that the phone companies would provide external interfaces, so-
called APIs, Application Programming Interfaces, which would 
allow third parties to decide on consumers' behalf and chosen 
by the consumer which calls to either block, redirect, or 
redirect to some third party, for example.
    The third type of solution I mentioned would be apps that 
you could install on your phone, on your smart phone, that 
would block it. Currently, these apps exist, but because they 
have to work a little bit on the side, they are not really well 
integrated into the existing phone devices, they do not work 
all that well, so with the cooperation of carriers, these type 
of downloadable apps could work much better than they do today.
    Just to add, the fourth one, again, is I believe that the 
kind of wholesale prevention of number spoofing could also make 
the job of enforcement much easier because it would become much 
more difficult for illegal telemarketers to spoof, for example, 
non-existing numbers, which is quite common today.
    The Chairman. Thank you, and I think the point is the 
technology does exist for us to deal with this problem.
    Senator McCaskill.
    Senator McCaskill. Thank you, Senator Collins.
    Professor, is there any law that we need for the encryption 
to assure the validity of a caller ID? Can that be done now 
without any kind of change in Federal law?
    Mr. Schulzrinne. I am not a lawyer, so--but, my sense is 
that adding cybersecurity--and this is an example of that--to 
technology does not generally require additional legal 
authorization, just like banks did not need to ask for the 
permission of the FDIC or of the Controller of the Currency to 
add protection to their bank websites. Indeed, longer term, I 
think we need to reverse the discussion, namely, what 
obligations do various participants have----
    Senator McCaskill. Right.
    Mr. Schulzrinne [continuing]. to protect it----
    Senator McCaskill. Right.
    Mr. Schulzrinne [continuing]. that information.
    Senator McCaskill. I think that--I will followup with the 
FCC and make sure, but I am hoping that along with the 
clarification, that there is no barrier to the common carriers' 
efforts to help consumers block this call, that they would also 
do what they can to encourage this encryption possibility, 
because I think it is a twofold problem. One is making sure the 
caller ID is who it says it is, and two, being able to block 
the calls.
    Deputy Attorney General, I know your office has done great 
work in this area, and I know you have banned 28 telemarketers, 
but I am, as you know, I am an old prosecutor. Are we not going 
to have to start putting some people in jail? I mean, the 
people that are doing this, the reason it is whack-a-mole is 
because they do not fear any authority at this point. They are 
fearless of authorities. If we began picking off--and I know 
that is it likely that we are going to get U.S. Attorneys' 
Offices to get all in on this? I am painfully aware of the 
limitations of your office in terms of criminal prosecutions, 
but are there laws in Missouri that you think currently would 
allow you to put some of these people in prison?
    Mr. Dandurand. I do not think we have laws that give the 
Attorney General's Office initial----
    Senator McCaskill. What about local prosecutors? Do they 
have it?
    Mr. Dandurand [continuing]. jurisdiction over those.
    Senator McCaskill. Would they have local--I am trying to 
think what they could be--I guess they could be prosecuted 
under stealing by deceit.
    Mr. Dandurand. They could, and there----
    Senator McCaskill. Or attempted stealing by deceit.
    Mr. Dandurand [continuing]. the consumer protection laws 
are there, so if it is a criminal violation of consumer 
protection, if you can prove their intent, rather than a simple 
violation but intent to scam, which makes it more difficult, 
those are available, but right now, it is difficult. The feds 
have been helpful in that regard and there are multi-State 
efforts to criminally prosecute folks, so they actually are--
DOJ is assisting in that regard, but we are fairly well 
handicapped without additional criminal jurisdiction, and as 
you know, that is very hard to come by, the authority.
    Senator McCaskill. Yes, and I am not even saying I am for 
that, but I am saying that we might want to look at what State 
statutes can be utilized and what communication you have with 
local prosecutors to help facilitate them bringing these cases. 
I do think the more people that are criminally prosecuted here, 
the more quickly you are going to clean some of this up.
    Let me ask you this. Does it work when you ban these 28 
telemarketers? Do they stay out? Have you caught them coming 
back after you have banned them?
    Mr. Dandurand. We have not caught the same named persons 
twice or the same named companies twice, but we certainly 
believe that they changed the name of the outfit and moved 
somewhere else, or just what they do, they network from State 
to State until they get barred in another State, then continue 
to do this, so that whack-a-mole theory is just truly, truly 
difficult to get a grip on.
    Senator McCaskill. What about cooperation from the common 
carriers? Ms. Greisman, you were at our hearing in 2013 and you 
know that--I mean, I do not get this, candidly. I think right 
now, if any carrier in this country came out with an ad 
campaign, forget about cut your bill in half, forget about 
``Can you hear me,'' forget about look at my network and how 
good it is, if they came out with an ad, we are going to block 
robocalls, I mean, I do not think they could handle the 
business they would get, and I do not get why they have been 
dragging their feet and why it is going to take the FCC 
clarifying that this is not a problem.
    Do you believe if the FCC votes the way we hope they are 
going to vote tomorrow that we will see a land rush of carriers 
coming to the forefront, saying, yes, we will offer this 
service to our customers, because Primus in Canada does it now 
to their customers at no charge.
    Ms. Greisman. Well, I would like to be cautiously 
optimistic, but not hold my breath on it. For years now, as you 
know, we have informally been urging carriers to do just that, 
citing Primus as a perfect model. The FTC formally commented on 
the FCC's proceeding, expressing its view that there is no 
legal impediment to providing a service that carrier 
subscribers are desperately asking for. We are eager to work 
with them, and they do participate in the various working 
groups that we have referred to, and again, I would like to be 
optimistic.
    Senator McCaskill. Usually, American companies are so smart 
about marketing. I do not get why all their marketers are so 
dumb on this. It is just amazing to me. Thank you.
    Mr. Schulzrinne. One reason, I believe, is that it is often 
sold as part of a bundle as opposed to a stand-alone service. 
Most people now get their voice service as part of a broadband, 
video, and voice bundle as opposed to----
    Senator McCaskill. They do not think it is going to let 
them--I do not think they realize, we have got choices on 
bundles. I have got two or three places I can go for a bundle. 
I would much rather go for the bundle when they are going to 
block these robocalls, I will guarantee you that, and I bet the 
vast majority of Americans agree with me.
    Thank you.
    The Chairman. Senator Heller--no, Senator Heller has left.
    Senator Tillis.
    Senator Tillis. Thank you, Madam Chair and Ranking Member. 
I have just gotten a copy of a bill I think you are going to be 
putting forward in terms of the Robocall and Call Spoofing 
Enforcement Improvement Act. I think there is some good 
thinking in there. I look forward to speaking with you about 
it.
    I wanted to continue the line of questioning about the 
reason why some of the common carriers would not be motivated 
to do it. It would seem to me that, again, it is a product 
differentiation, so then, it raises the question, is there some 
other economic value to these calls going through? Do any of 
you care to speak on that?
    Professor.
    Mr. Schulzrinne. I can--the economic value differs greatly 
between carriers. That are usually so-called termination 
charges or--but my sense, not being a carrier business person, 
is that the amount of money they would get for termination 
charges is de minimis, particularly for the largest carriers. 
Most of the access charges are paid to small rural carriers, 
for good reasons, but they are not the ones complaining about 
inability to block, so large carriers get very little, 
particularly because they symmetrically exchange traffic with 
each other, so I have a hard time believing that it is simply a 
lost revenue one.
    What I have heard informally from engineers is that, often, 
the voice technology that is being deployed is not seen as a 
revenue producing opportunity. It is essentially a must-offer 
technology. You have to offer voice, just like a cable company 
offers e-mail service, but they do not differentiate based on 
that, and so they seem very reluctant, in some cases, to invest 
resources into improving the technology they have.
    Senator Tillis. Yes, and Professor, I wanted to ask you 
some questions about the technology. You were talking about, I 
think, some of the emerging technologies for Voice over IP. It 
is very easy to see with the simultaneous ring, I know how that 
works, with the VOIP providers and how the APIs could be used 
and that underlying technology, or even with the cell 
technology.
    Then, there is still this area out there with the older 
exchanges, non-IP based, that even if we make headway in the IP 
infrastructure, Voice over IP, then it seems like some of the 
more vulnerable areas are going to be rural, they are going to 
be almost disproportionately have more aged populations, the 
folks who still have the traditional exchanges, so what sort of 
technology options are there for those sorts of residences that 
are still in--or two generations behind, arguably, most of the 
telephony that younger people or people in urban areas use?
    Mr. Schulzrinne. Senator, as the Chairman pointed out, most 
of these illegal or non-wanted robocalls, I would say, almost 
all of them originate in Voice over IP, and so they----
    Senator Tillis. They can originate there, but they could 
ultimately end up at a private exchange.
    Mr. Schulzrinne. Exactly.
    Senator Tillis. That is what I was referring to.
    Mr. Schulzrinne. What happens is there is always a gateway 
between those two worlds, the legacy world, if you like, the 
TDM world, as it is called, and the Voice over IP world, so 
those gateway providers are in a unique position to do exactly 
that filtering. They have modern, software-controlled 
equipment----
    Senator Tillis. At a point of entry.
    Mr. Schulzrinne [continuing]. at the point of entry.
    Senator Tillis. What sense do you have in terms of the cost 
to implement--I understand what you are talking about, because 
it is more or less the gateway between the IP originated call 
and the traditional teleco exchange. What sorts of technologies 
exist out there today, and in rough order of magnitude, what 
kind of costs are we talking about?
    Mr. Schulzrinne. Again, I am not an equipment vendor, so I 
do not want to speculate too much, but generally speaking, 
these devices that are interfacing between these two walls are 
called session border controllers and they are designed to be 
highly programmable, so they already have interfaces for other 
purposes, such as billing, other fraud control measures that 
they take to prevent toll fraud, to do that, so my sense is 
that with existing deployed gateway technology, it requires not 
adding hardware but adding additional software functionality 
that is well within the realm of feasibility.
    Senator Tillis. Thank you very much. Thank you, Madam 
Chair.
    The Chairman. Thank you.
    Senator Kaine.
    Senator Kaine. Thank you, Madam Chairwoman, and thanks to 
all the witnesses for being here today and your testimony.
    I just noticed that earlier today it was announced that the 
House appropriations bill was released and it proposes for the 
FCC in Fiscal Year 2016 a $315 million budget, which is a $25 
million cut below Fiscal Year 2015, and $73 billion below the 
President's submitted Fiscal Year 2016 budget request. We have 
got a lot of budget issues, but this is an issue that demands 
vigorous FCC enforcement, and at the very time when we need it 
for this challenge and other challenges, dramatically reducing 
the FCC's budget seems unwise to me. That is a personal 
opinion.
    I want to talk about the issue of sort of consumer 
education. I would assume that that has got to be a key part of 
this. There is the enforcement strategies, there is the 
technical approaches to solving the problem, but also on the 
consumer education side.
    Ms. Blase, I am a little bit interested in your testimony. 
You know, you started to get this log because you knew that 
these calls were scams. What is the best way to get information 
out to seniors or others who might be vulnerable to scams, and 
what is the best advice that we should be giving them? Is it 
just do not do telephone solicitations? I hear my wife all the 
time say, ``I do not do solicitation by phone,'' click. What is 
the best advice, but then what are the best channels through 
which to get advice to people, in your view?
    Ms. Blase. I would say the best advice is to just not 
answer the calls. If you answer the calls, you are giving them 
more information than you want them to have. If you do not 
answer the calls, they eventually will stop calling you, but 
then they will change. They will get a new number, they will 
try again, and they will think that maybe this time you will 
answer the call, so I think that is the best thing that you can 
do, is just not answer it.
    You can get some of these robocall devices, blocking 
devices. You can use Nomorobo, but those things have to be 
programmed. You have to say, do not answer this number from 
this caller ID, and then when they change, which they do, then 
you start all over, so it is--I hate to say it again--it is 
whack-a-mole. It is totally whack-a-mole. There is one company 
that keeps calling that is associated with five different 
companies with a bunch of different phone numbers and you 
cannot chop off all those heads.
    Senator Kaine. Mm-hmm.
    Ms. Blase. You know, they just go from one to the other, to 
the other, to the other, to the other and there is nothing you 
can do about it.
    Senator Kaine. How about to my enforcement community 
experts? What is your thought about the advice we should be 
giving? One of the things that this Committee, I think, does 
very well is that we have a website. We put up information. We 
have a hotline for complaints. We try to use these hearings as 
a way to give people advice. Here is what you should do, so 
what is your general thought about the best advice that we 
should be giving to people?
    Mr. Dandurand. We have the very same information on our 
website and we do consumer education and awareness across the 
State, and another piece of advice is, it is not going to be do 
not answer the phone, it is this. If you answer the phone and 
there is any hesitation, then hang it up, because that often is 
what you will get. You say, ``Hello,'' and it will be dead 
silence until the robocall kicks in.
    The problem I see, and that is why we need the help with 
the blockers at its inception, is that my father will be 85 
next month. He tells me, ``Nobody ever calls me.'' I do not 
care for so many of those folks what we tell them or how often 
we tell them. If the phone rings, they are going to answer the 
phone and they are thrilled to talk to anybody, so we need more 
help than consumer education, which we beat the drum daily on, 
but the question is a good one.
    Senator Kaine. Please, Ms. Greisman.
    Ms. Greisman. Consumer education is a critical component of 
our law enforcement work and policy work. Our consumer ed 
message is pretty clear and it is generally consistent with 
what you have heard. If you pick up the phone and it is a 
robocaller and you do not know who it is, hang up. Do not press 
one, do not press two, just hang up the phone, and we 
disseminate that message loudly, broadly, through the AARP, 
through Consumer Federation of America, Consumers Union. We 
have tremendous outreach with our educational initiatives.
    Senator Kaine. Then, Ms. Blase, back to you, so had you 
received consumer--you know, when you started to do the log and 
everything, was that just because of your own kind of innate, 
you were just mad at these folks, or you were suspicious, or 
had you--I am curious, had you received consumer education 
enough to know, yes, these are scams and I need to keep a 
record of them?
    Ms. Blase. Well, I was annoyed beyond belief and had kept 
just a little written thing saying, okay, this one did this, 
this one did that, just kept it on a piece of paper, sometimes 
sticky notes in my drawer, but then when Consumers Union 
decided to really take this on, they asked people to start 
keeping a log, so I changed my format from scribbling stuff 
down to actually making this log and did it because that is 
what they asked to do.
    There were several places where--there were several 
requirements for this, where you log them, then you use a 
robocaller, then you turn off the robocaller and you log them 
again so that you can see if the robocaller--the blocker--if 
that made any difference, so I was mostly following their 
instructions on what to do, but then my attention to detail 
probably got out of hand and I kept a whole lot more 
information than I needed to.
    I would like to make a correction from my further answer to 
your question. I went back and looked at my testimony, my 
written testimony. The 74 calls were the number of calls that I 
got. Sixty-two of those calls--it was less than that before, 
when I sent you the log. Adding the ones that got back, 62 of 
those were robocalls that were not charities. Those were actual 
telemarketing or scam calls, so it was 62 out of 74 were 
horrible things.
    I even kept--to answer some of the other questions--I even 
kept carrier locations from some of these to see if I could 
find some kind of a pattern, but I could not. They are all over 
the map.
    Senator Kaine. You have an interesting story, because you 
kind of combined the robocalls that might be directed toward 
seniors with the robocalls that are directed to businesses, and 
you are running a business out of your house. You are not going 
to be that successful in your business if you just do not 
answer the phone, so you have got to answer the phone. Have you 
had conversations with other business owners about this, other 
small business owners, and are they experiencing the same 
thing, because we are kind of talking about two different kinds 
of scam calls and I am wondering how constant it is on the 
business side, especially with small businesses.
    Ms. Blase. I have not talked to people, but I have gone 
online and looked at testimonials from business people and it 
is all over.
    Senator Kaine. Okay.
    Ms. Blase. They are all--these people call my business 
three times a day. I get this call five times a week. I tell 
them to stop calling and they keep calling, so it is pretty 
much rampant that it is across the board, you know.
    Oh, and one more thing about people having some 
information. Of course, the one trying to sell the little 
bracelet, where it starts, ``Hello, seniors,'' well, he had 
enough information to know that I am a senior, so----
    Senator Kaine. I forgot I was on a clock. I was so 
interested in the questions, I ran way over. Sorry, Madam 
Chair. Thank you all.
    The Chairman. Thank you.
    Senator Donnelly. You are the one who can complain to your 
colleague. I am going to give him a pass today, is what I am 
going to do.
    Senator Blumenthal. I am not going to.
    Senator Donnelly. Well, you are like that, Richard.
    Thank you all for being here, and this is for Mr. 
Dandurand, the first question. In your written testimony, you 
cite an example of a complaint from an 80-year-old woman from 
St. Louis, our Ranking Member's State, who received an unwanted 
call for a back brace paid for by Medicare. We have heard about 
these calls from seniors' organizations, physicians, from folks 
in Indiana who have been on the receiving end of harassing 
phone calls from medical equipment suppliers offering medical 
equipment like back braces that they neither want nor need, and 
the suppliers use aggressive tactics to persuade seniors into 
ordering unnecessary items at Medicare's expense. We have an 
obligation to protect the privacy seniors have and also to 
protect taxpayer dollars.
    Can you talk more, or a little bit more, you know, in your 
position as Deputy Attorney General, about the trends you are 
seeing in regards to calls like these.
    Mr. Dandurand. I would, and to sort of talk about what 
Senator Kaine said, and Senator McCaskill, as well, funding is 
a big problem, and if we are going to cut funding for 
enforcement, we are going to have more of a problem. Our office 
operates on 15 percent less than we did when we started in 
2009, but when we increased the ability to register your cell 
phones, we increased the number of phones we are responsible 
for from two million to four million with no more folks to deal 
with it, so they know that.
    The trends are just, I think, somewhat, Senator Collins, 
away from landlines toward cell phones now that they are 
getting this figured out, how to get to these cell phones, and 
it is going to mushroom and mushroom, because so far, we still 
get a lot of complaints, more complaints, really, from the 
folks that are registered landlines, so the trends are they are 
getting ahead of technology and they are really working on 
people's cell phones, even with the sophistication those cell 
phones have to try to block these things.
    Senator Donnelly. Well, if you look at the Federal level 
here, what is the one or two things that we can do to help you?
    Mr. Dandurand. There is a No Call Working Group that the 
feds have right now, and all the states that want to join that 
do, and they stay abreast of all of the cutting edge things 
that are available to use, so I think that any help that we can 
receive, Senator McCaskill's bill that she is looking at that I 
have not seen yet, but hopefully is going to help with this, 
those sort of things will be helpful, but I have to give credit 
as I can to the feds for all the assistance they give to us 
states as it is.
    Senator Donnelly. Ms. Blase, you are a tireless bulldog on 
this issue, and as you look at this, you know, one of the 
things that has struck me is when a caller ID comes up and 
displays ``FBI,'' you know, that means so many things to people 
in our country, and when you saw that, I am interested, how did 
you know that when you saw FBI that that was a scam?
    Ms. Blase. I did not know when I saw FBI. I picked up the 
phone and answered the call and it did not take me fifteen 
seconds to figure out that it was a scam, because the man said, 
well, we are conducting this investigation and your name popped 
up, and I went, why would my--and it was a drug investigation, 
and I said, sure, my name is going to pop up on a drug 
investigation, so I basically told him he was a fraud and hung 
up, because that is the way I felt about it. Of course, I had 
second thoughts and I looked up the area code and it was a 
Washington, D.C. area code, and I thought, oh, my goodness, 
what if I just really screwed up? I called my local office at 
the FBI and said, tell me about this. Do you have any record of 
any of this? They said, it is totally a scam and you did 
exactly the right thing.
    Senator Donnelly. If you had one or two recommendations for 
folks around the country as you looked--you have gone through a 
lot of this--what would be the one or two things that you would 
most say to them, here is what you really need to do when this 
kind of stuff starts. Number one, not pick up the phone.
    Ms. Blase. Not pick up the phone. Do not press one. Do not 
press two. Do not do any of those things. If you cannot pick up 
the phone, then that is what you should do, but too many of us 
have to know what is on the other end of that line. You want to 
know what is there. What if it is--I have friends who are 
``private callers,'' who want their phone numbers not to 
display, so you do not know when you see ``private caller'' if 
that is your friend in New Zealand or if that is somebody 
calling to scam you or to try to sell you something, so you are 
tempted to at least pick up those unknown callers or private 
caller things, just to find out what it is. As soon as you know 
what it is, hang it up. I have a friend who will not refuse to 
answer those. She will always pick up the phone, no matter how 
many times I tell her not to.
    Senator Donnelly. Thank you very much, and Madam Chair, 
right on time.
    The Chairman. You are, indeed. You get a gold star.
    Senator Blumenthal.
    Senator Blumenthal. Thank you, Senator Donnelly.
    You know, I served as Attorney General of the State of 
Connecticut for 20 years. I battled against these kinds of 
scams, and often, we look to the FTC, because of its broader 
authority. We were members of a working group, and so, let me 
ask you first, Ms. Greisman, can you give us some examples of 
alleged violations that you could not pursue because of lack of 
authority.
    Ms. Greisman. What I would say in that regard, where we 
encounter challenges, it is presented by the Common Carrier 
Exemption. There is a blurry line between telemarketers and 
carriers, and we have worked closely with our colleagues at the 
FCC to address this issue, where we see bad carriers, but the 
distinctions between carriers and non-carriers can be very gray 
and----
    Senator Blumenthal. Is that an authority problem or an 
enforcement----
    Ms. Greisman. It is a jurisdictional problem. We are 
precluded from--the Common Carrier Exemption, I cannot recall 
when it dates back to, but it is part of the FTC statute.
    Senator Blumenthal. There is a vacuum there that has to be 
filled.
    Ms. Greisman. Correct.
    Senator Blumenthal. Any other areas where your authority 
really has to be broadened to give you the enforcement 
jurisdiction?
    Ms. Greisman. Nothing readily comes to mind, but let me 
think about that.
    Senator Blumenthal. I think that is the basis for 
legislative change, is to broaden your authority so that 
enforcement can be more effective, because that authority 
essentially turns these violations into garden variety scams. 
They are dressed up in new technology, but they are basically 
scams, con artists using a different technology, and what you 
need is the resources and the authority to go after them, 
correct?
    Ms. Greisman. I agree. Thank you.
    Senator Blumenthal. You mentioned, Assistant Attorney 
General Dandurand, that you have been talking in the working 
group against some of the cutting edge issues. You used the 
words ``cutting edge.'' Can you give us some idea of what those 
are.
    Mr. Dandurand. Well, I would again defer to them, because I 
do not sit on those calls, and I do not want to talk about 
something I am not versed in, so our no call people who are on 
those calls could do that, but I would not want to try to talk 
about something I am not versed in.
    Senator Blumenthal. What are you doing that is cutting 
edge, Ms. Greisman?
    Ms. Greisman. We have traditional law enforcement, but we 
are also discussing on those calls with our colleagues at the 
State level the different types of technological solutions that 
we have been stimulating the marketplace to develop and also 
discussing our efforts to work with the common carriers, as I 
alluded to before, to be more proactive in their anti-fraud 
efforts.
    Senator Blumenthal. Do you have data on how often the Do 
Not Call Registry is abused?
    Ms. Greisman. That is an interesting question, and I 
believe, Senator McCaskill, you referred to that earlier. To 
the best of my knowledge, we are not aware of telemarketers or 
others accessing the Do Not Call Registry in an improper 
manner. In fact, in our law enforcement work, and we have 
brought well over 100 cases involving the Do Not Call 
provisions, it is truly the exception for any single one of 
those telemarketers to have accessed the registry. They are 
getting their calling lists from lead generators, from other 
sources.
    Senator Blumenthal. Probably those other sources are 
readily available to them and they do not need to abuse the 
registry.
    Ms. Greisman. I think that is correct.
    Mr. Schulzrinne. I mean, just to add a technology angle to 
that, they can just do sequential dialing. It is easy to find 
out which area codes and exchanges are assigned, so they can 
just simply go through numbers one by one. They do not need any 
lists for that. On occasion, they obviously do try to target 
using a variety of publicly available lists, as well.
    Senator Blumenthal. Thank you. Well, I want to thank this 
panel for this very informative and helpful testimony, and 
thank you, Madam Chair, for having the hearing. I have 45 
seconds left, which I will yield to Senator Kaine.
    Senator McCaskill. We are never going to get over this.
    Senator Blumenthal. Thank you, Madam Chairman.
    The Chairman. Thank you very much. I am just going to ask 
one final question, and then if everyone, including Senator 
Kaine, wants to have one final question, they are welcome to do 
so, also, and it is for you, Ms. Greisman.
    You gave really startling statistics in your testimony. You 
said at the end of 2009, the FTC received approximately 63,000 
complaints about illegal robocalls per month, and now that 
number is up to 150,000 complaints per month, so that is an 
explosion of complaints, and I can tell you, most people do not 
call the FTC and register a complaint. They do not even know 
that is an option, so what do you do with those 150,000 
complaints that you are getting?
    Ms. Greisman. They are incredibly valuable for law 
enforcement, and they are in a data base that is accessible to 
all of our State colleagues and our Federal colleagues. We mine 
the data. We generate targets from that data, so I cannot 
under-emphasize how critical it is for consumers to file 
complaints with us, and I appreciate that Ms. Blase has done 
just that.
    The Chairman. That is very helpful to know, because I think 
when consumers file complaints, they often wonder, was it worth 
it? Was anyone listening? Did anything happen? Is anyone going 
to get back to me? Do you actually try to respond to the 
complaints?
    Ms. Greisman. That is just not practicable----
    The Chairman. Given the volume.
    Ms. Greisman. Given the volume, it is not possible.
    The Chairman. Do you have--when people put a complaint on 
your site, do you have a list of tips for them or advice for 
them to avoid becoming a victim?
    Ms. Greisman. Absolutely. When they file a complaint 
online, there are lots of buttons that provide consumer 
education, business education, other tips on what to do.
    The Chairman. I put out a seniors' newsletter that we put 
in Area Agencies on Aging, senior centers, et cetera, and what 
we are thinking of is having some sort of clip-out coupon that 
consumers can take with them, or that we can try using AARP to 
put into people's homes so they know what to do, because I 
think there are very few people who are like Ms. Blase and 
really know what is going on.
    Prior to looking into this matter, if I had seen the IRS or 
the FBI or the Bangor, Maine Police Department come up on my 
landline at home, you can bet I would answer that call. Now, I 
hope I would have been able to discern that it was not 
legitimate--at least, I hope it would not be legitimate, but 
for most people, that is a pretty scary name or number to see 
come up, especially when it is the legitimate number.
    Mr. Dandurand. Madam Chair?
    The Chairman. Yes.
    Mr. Dandurand. One thing we are also seeing, and I am sure 
you know this and it may have already been mentioned, is we are 
seeing e-mails now with FBI on there, as well----
    The Chairman. Interesting.
    Mr. Dandurand [continuing]. telling you that you have to 
contact them immediately in regards to investigations that are 
taking place involving you and such.
    The Chairman. Well, one of my hopes is that our hearing 
today will help to heighten public awareness, and it has been 
particularly valuable, Professor, to learn from you that the 
technology is out there, and to me, that is the most important 
take-away from this hearing today. I think we need to push the 
telephone companies, the telecoms, to implement the technology 
in the name of consumer protection, and I will be following the 
FTC's work with great interest in this area.
    Senator McCaskill.
    Senator McCaskill. While we were talking, I went on to try 
to file a complaint, and pretty straightforward. There is a lot 
of good information when you go to the home page, when you just 
put in ``FTC robocall complaint,'' and then it allows you to 
link through to a complaint. The one thing I do not file, 
though, is, ``Please file a complaint because it helps us catch 
them.''
    Ms. Greisman. That is a very good point.
    Senator McCaskill. You know, I think that Ms. Blase made a 
point. You are barely, barely getting the tip of the iceberg in 
terms of these complaints, and I think there are people out 
there like Ms. Blase who obviously is my favorite witness that 
we have had, like, forever, because I can tell you are just my 
kind of woman. It is just like, no nonsense, rack them up, let 
us get this thing solved, and I think there are a lot of people 
out there like Ms. Blase, who if they knew that filing this 
complaint would help you find these guys and catch them, they 
would be much more interested in going through the process, and 
so, maybe on that front page where you have all the different 
options of learning about how to avoid robocalls, maybe if you 
did a big banner, ``by filing a complaint, you help us catch 
them,'' it would increase the number of complaints.
    Yes, Ms. Blase.
    Ms. Blase. I think that is exactly right, because I stopped 
filing them. I filed several and I did not hear a word back, 
and nothing seemed to go away, so I did not know if it was 
making a difference, but if you tell me this is going to make a 
difference, I will go right back to doing that.
    Senator McCaskill. There you go. You may not need anybody 
else to file complaints to catch the bad guys because Ms. Blase 
is back on it.
    Thank you, Madam Chairman.
    The Chairman. Senator Kaine.
    Senator Kaine. I appreciate the Chairwoman allowing me to 
ask an additional 15 questions.
    No, I do not have any other questions, Madam Chair. Thank 
you, and thanks to all of you.
    The Chairman. Thank you.
    I want to thank all of our witnesses today. This has been 
extremely illuminating and I think we can make a real 
difference here in helping the public to be more aware. I love 
the idea of your actually having an automatic response that 
goes to consumers who file complaints that tells them that it 
is helpful to them, and I think that would help them feel that 
it was worthwhile, even if it does not--if you are not 
responding to their specific complaint. People like to feel 
that they make a difference, and this panel has certainly made 
a difference.
    This hearing is about to adjourn, if I could find my 
closing statement which tells me how long the record is to be 
open, and I have it. I want to thank all of our witnesses, and 
as you can see, there was a great deal of interest in this 
hearing today by our excellent attendance. The Committee 
members will have until Friday, June 19th, to submit any 
additional questions for the record or testimony.
    I want to thank both the Majority and Minority staff for 
their work in putting today's hearing together.
    This concludes the hearing. Thank you.
    [Whereupon, at 3:53 p.m., the Committee was adjourned.]




      
      
      
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                                APPENDIX

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                      Prepared Witness Statements

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                       Statements for the Record

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