Company develops app to fight robocalls
ALBANY, N.Y. (WTEN) — If you feel like you get robocalls almost daily and that they are getting worse, it’s not just you.
It’s the dreaded robocall. The best case scenario, it’s your dentist appointment reminder, but worse case, it could be a scammer. That buzzing just doesn’t stop.
“I disconnected my home phone and part of it is because I was only getting robocalls,” Assemblywoman Pat Fahy (D-Albany) said.
Assemblywoman Fahy is not the only one fed up with the increase in calls. In July of this year, an estimated five billion robocalls were made. This is an increase of almost 900 million calls from last year.
Robocalls are the number one complaint the FCC receives. Right now, there is little that can be done on the federal and state level that won’t invade on free speech.
“We’re going to be continued to be annoyed. I’m afraid until they’re not effective, the best way to make them not effective is to not respond.”
One company is trying to fight back.
“We created an app called RoboKiller that blocks these calls from ever reaching your phone,” Ethan Garr, VP of Product for RoboKiller, said.
RoboKiller is designed with audio fingerprinting, machine learning and artificial intelligence to determine if a call coming in is a robocall. If it is, the app answers the call for you and pretends to be a real person to waste the scammer’s time.
“So you get a little revenge and get even with them. If our answer bot is wasting a telemarketer’s time, then they can’t call you or call someone’s grandmother.”
RoboKiller was rated the number one app for fighting robocalls by the Federal Trade Commission as part of an effort to create technology to fight robocalls.
The fight is not over yet and this problem will most likely be raised again this legislative year.