Thursday, August 25, 2016

It's About Time!
Thank you AT&T



Huge news! After a year of organizing, you and thousands of fellow anti-robocalls activists just achieved a major win. On Friday, 33 companies, 2 federal regulators, and the Department of Justice sat down at a historic summit to face the robocalls crisis. By the end of the day, all the major phone companies, led by AT&T CEO Randall Stephenson, announced the creation of a Strike Force to take on the robocalls epidemic.
I wish you could have been there to see it: in front of national press and the heads of the Federal Communications Commission, Stephenson and other phone company executives pledged to outline a clear line of attack against robocalls by October 19th.
We applaud AT&T for listening to the thousands of customers and robocalls activists who have pressed them to do more. And I want to be crystal clear: your activism got consumers a seat at the table. There’s simply no way that all these powerful executives and government officials would have come together to deal with this problem if you hadn’t convinced them — strategically, effectively, and repeatedly — that robocalls are a major problem demanding major solutions.
Over the next two months, we will keep up the pressure to ensure that the Strike Force doesn’t produce just another set of empty promises. Even when we have an actionable plan from the Strike Force, it’ll take continued oversight and perseverance to move from talk to action, and see a tangible reduction in the number of pernicious robocalls to our phones. But today, I hope you can savor a victory and sign of progress made entirely possible by your hard work.
Onward to victory!

Tim Marvin, EndRobocalls.org
Consumers Union, Policy and Action from Consumer Reports