A Pox on Robo-Calls!

The Federal Communications Commission is the government agency with the authority to regulate, among other things, unwanted telephone solicitation calls. The chair of the Federal Communications Commission is a man named Ajit Pai. I’d like him to know that I got four phone calls early Friday morning. Very early. They came in at 1:17 a.m., at 1:57 a.m., at 3:07 a.m. and at 4:23 a.m. 

According to the display on my phone, the first call came from Belarus, a country located between Poland and Russia. Call number two supposedly originated from the British Virgin Islands. The third call was shown coming from Los Angeles, but it had a four-digit area code. 

The forth call showed a Hawaii area code, but I dumped it anyway. 

We get three or four of these calls during the day, too—the first one today was bright and early at about 6:30 a.m. We’re up at that hour, but hardly in the mood to hear a recorded voice telling us we can get a better interest rate on our credit card debt. 

Then there are the people who call once every few weeks to inform me that their highly sophisticated electronic equipment has detected a problem with my PC. Yesterday came a similar call with the same heavy Filipino accent, but with a new twist: I’m entitled to a $299 rebate on my PC. One small problem, fellas … my computer is a Mac.

I haven’t kept an actual count, but I’ll bet we get another four or five unsolicited calls every day, including legitimate fund-raising calls on behalf of a variety of non-profits. But the trouble is, the unscrupulous SOBs behind these robo-calls will continue to interrupt my days without the slightest concern and plug my phone number into their infernal machine to determine God-knows-what! and costume will.

The Federal Communications Commission is the government agency with the authority to regulate at least some of these people. Contact 888-225-5322 and select option 4.