WASHINGTON--The Federal Communications Commission’s (FCC) proposal to restrict the resale of phone numbers is a positive development, as resale of can undermine transparency, accountability, and effective enforcement in the numbering ecosystem, assert America’s Credit Unions, the Defense Credit Union Council and other financial services organizations that submitted a letter to the FCC in support of the proposal.
Specifically, it would restrict the resale of phone numbers to a single level, meaning providers obtaining phone numbers from the North American Numbering Plan Administrator must provide those numbers to end users and not resell the numbers to another party that will provide the number to an end user.
The organizations note that illegal call spoofing is “a primary means by which bad actors perpetrate fraud” and thank the FCC for advancing “a number of proposals to combat illegal spoofing, including proposals that would impose stronger ‘know your customer’ requirements on voice service providers that originate calls (originating providers) and on ‘upstream’ providers that allow calls to pass through their network.”
The letter also notes the organizations “seek to advance their brand and deepen their relationship with consumers by using a consistent set of phone numbers from which to place calls.”