There is an excellent chance that you’ve received a robocall recently. These recorded messages have become a regular, unwanted presence of unsolicited sales calls and over the phone identity theft and other schemes that now total into the billions each year. The organizations behind these calls are operating with the intentions of catching unaware consumers and scamming them into a sale or scaring them into disclosing personal information. One common scheme seeks to collect social security numbers in a call that purports to come from the IRS.
Many times, calls target underserved and vulnerable communities. People may receive frightening messages claiming their electricity will be shut off in 30 minutes if they don’t turn over their credit card numbers, for example. Younger cell phone users in high school or college being told they’ve violated a federal law and must issue payment to avoid prosecution. Both tactics are common in the world of robocall scams.
Latino consumers are also disproportionately affected due to lower rate of English proficiency, broadly speaking. More folks who are born abroad have English as a second language and perhaps less familiarity with how the IRS contacts taxpayers (to sue the above example) and so are more susceptible to robocall scams.
A bipartisan push on Capitol Hill is attempting to advance legislation that would both protect cell phone users, and prosecute companies that conduct illegal robocalls. There are proposed bills that would issue a $10,000 fine to a company for each illegal robocall and extend the statute of limitations on prosecuting these companies from one to three years. In the executive branch, the Federal Communication Commission has also sought to take steps within its regulatory authority to combat robocalls.
HLF will be monitoring existing government efforts to address this issue as policymakers move to put an end to this disruptive and fraudulent practice.
