Spamalot
The Federal Communications Commission is finally taking steps to crack down on those annoying spam texts that have been popping up more frequently on your phone.
Yesterday the FCC revealed plans to stop spam at the source, proposing that mobile carriers must block numbers known for spewing out illegal scams.
That's likely to be a popular crackdown, as new data shows the extent of the spam text problem in America. In August an estimated 10.9bn spam texts were sent in the US according to numbers from RoboKiller, an app that blocks potentially-dangerous calls and texts. That works out to nearly 39 spam texts per person per month — a number that's risen substantially in the last year.
Efforts to tackle spam have thus far concentrated mostly on robocalls, requiring networks to meet strict authentication requirements to prevent annoying automated callers. Scammers, as a result, seem to be phoning in their call operations and turning to texts as an alternative.
