Americans Received 55 Billion Robocalls In 2023, A 9% Jump From 2022

Scams

from the please-take-this,-we-weren't-using-it dept

It’s extremely weird that we’ve somehow normalized the fact that scammers, scumbags, debt collectors, and marketers have made the U.S.’ primary voice communication platform largely unusable.

There is some good news: according to data from the YouMail Robocall Index, U.S. consumers received just under 3.8 billion robocalls during the month of December, a 16.3% decrease from the month before.

The bad news: that November to December decrease usually happens (predatory scumbags take breaks over the holidays like everybody else) and may not be fully representative of a meaningful trend. The company also found that Americans received more than 55 billion robocalls in 2023, a 9% increase from 2022.

There was a 38 percent drop in scam calls, thanks (in part) to efforts at the FCC. The agency has, belatedly, been trying to force long-apathetic wireless carriers into implementing better SHAKEN/STIR anti-number-spoofing tech, and it seems to be helping. Though popping the bubbly is premature given we’re still talking about 8.1 billion scam calls made every year to U.S. consumers alone:

“There was a 38% reduction in scam calls, down to just over 8.1 billion scam calls for the year. This stems from a combination of much less call spoofing due to Stir/Shaken being rolled out almost universally, as well as scammers getting much more targeted in their calling campaigns. Secondly, this reduction in scam calls led to likely unwanted calls declining from 49% of all calls to 43% of all robocalls, with over 1.3 billion fewer likely unwanted calls for the year.”

One major problem, as we’ve discussed previously, is that focusing exclusively on “scam” calls doesn’t paint an accurate picture of the problem. Groups like the National Consumer Law Center have pointed out for years that legitimate corporations and debt collectors are among the biggest contributors to robocall annoyance, and use many of the same tactics as outright scammers.

The National Consumer Law Center has been testifying before Congress for years that our robocall problem persists for several key reasons:

• Lobbying by a coalition of industries has routinely led to Supreme Court rulings that have curtailed the FCC’s authority to pursue “scammers” and legitimate companies alike.
• Lobbying by those same mainstream industries has resulted in a paradigm where the discourse fixates on “scammers,” when “legitimate” corporations are routinely the biggest culprits, often using the same exact tactics as scammers to do things like harass heavily-indebted people they know can’t pay, or upsell consumers to services they’ve already said they don’t want (telecom loves this one).
• The FCC has long lacked the backbone to stand up to telcos and wireless providers that for 20+ years turned a blind eye on robocalling and other scams because they profited from the traffic running over their networks (and in many cases still do).
• The current system allows the FCC to fine robocallers, but doesn’t give the FCC the authority to actually collect those fines. That falls to the DOJ, which often doesn’t bother. The FCC has repeatedly asked for the authority to collect fines itself, but a corrupt Congress ignores the request, thanks to a prevailing “wisdom,” seeded by industry, that competent regulatory oversight is somehow bad.

We could truly put the robocall problem to bed if we addressed the fact that major corporations and corporate-friendly, rightward-lurching courts have turned our robocall regulatory enforcement into swiss cheese. But that’s not a bet I’d be willing to make anytime soon.

The notable increase comes despite an endless parade of FCC proclamations that they’re finally taking the problem more seriously. Every so often the agency insists it’s taken historic steps toward fixing the problem, yet the problem continues to grow.

Filed Under: consumer rights, fcc, phone calls, robocalls, scammers, scams, shaken, spammers, spoofing, stir