I 

116TH CONGRESS 

1ST SESSION H. R. 3780 

To direct the Federal Communications Commission to establish an advisory 

committee to develop best practices regarding how to combat unlawful 

robocalls made to hospitals and how hospitals can protect themselves 

from such calls, and for other purposes. 

IN THE HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES 

JULY 16, 2019 

Mrs. DINGELL (for herself and Mr. BURGESS) introduced the following bill; 

which was referred to the Committee on Energy and Commerce 

A BILL 

To direct the Federal Communications Commission to establish an advisory committee to develop best practices regarding how to combat unlawful robocalls made to hospitals and how hospitals can protect themselves from 

such calls, and for other purposes. 

1 Be it enacted by the Senate and House of Representa2 tives of the United States of America in Congress assembled, 

3 SECTION 1. SHORT TITLE. 

4 This Act may be cited as the ‘‘Protecting Patients 

5 and Doctors from Unlawful Robocalls Act of 2019’’. 


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1 SEC. 2. HOSPITAL ROBOCALL PROTECTION GROUP. 

2 (a) ESTABLISHMENT.—Not later than 180 days after 

3 the date of the enactment of this Act, the Commission 

4 shall establish an advisory committee to be known as the 

5 ‘‘Hospital Robocall Protection Group’’. 

6 (b) MEMBERSHIP.—The Group shall be composed 

7 only of the following members: 

8 (1) An equal number of representatives from 

9 each of the following: 

10 (A) Voice service providers that serve hos11 pitals. 

12 (B) Companies that focus on mitigating 

13 unlawful robocalls. 

14 (C) Consumer advocacy organizations. 

15 (D) Providers of one-way voice over inter16 net protocol services described in subsection 

17 (e)(4)(B)(ii). 

18 (E) Hospitals. 

19 (F) State government officials focused on 

20 combatting unlawful robocalls. 

21 (2) One representative of the Commission. 

22 (3) One representative of the Federal Trade 

23 Commission. 

24 (c) ISSUANCE OF BEST PRACTICES.—Not later than 

25 180 days after the date on which the Group is established 


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•HR 3780 IH

1 under subsection (a), the Group shall issue best practices 

2 regarding the following: 

3 (1) How voice service providers can better com4 bat unlawful robocalls made to hospitals. 

5 (2) How hospitals can better protect themselves 

6 from such calls, including by using unlawful robocall 

7 mitigation techniques. 

8 (3) How the Federal Government and State 

9 governments can help combat such calls. 

10 (d) PROCEEDING BY FCC.—Not later than 180 days 

11 after the date on which the best practices are issued by 

12 the Group under subsection (c), the Commission shall con13 clude a proceeding to assess the extent to which the vol14 untary adoption of such best practices can be facilitated 

15 to protect hospitals and other institutions. 

16 (e) DEFINITIONS.—In this section: 

17 (1) COMMISSION.—The term ‘‘Commission’’ 

18 means the Federal Communications Commission. 

19 (2) GROUP.—The term ‘‘Group’’ means the 

20 Hospital Robocall Protection Group established 

21 under subsection (a). 

22 (3) STATE.—The term ‘‘State’’ has the mean23 ing given such term in section 3 of the Communica24 tions Act of 1934 (47 U.S.C. 153). 


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1 (4) VOICE SERVICE.—The term ‘‘voice serv2 ice’’— 

3 (A) means any service that is inter4 connected with the public switched telephone 

5 network and that furnishes voice communica6 tions to an end user using resources from the 

7 North American Numbering Plan or any suc8 cessor to the North American Numbering Plan 

9 adopted by the Commission under section 

10 251(e)(1) of the Communications Act of 1934 

11 (47 U.S.C. 251(e)(1)); and 

12 (B) includes— 

13 (i) transmissions from a telephone 

14 facsimile machine, computer, or other de15 vice to a telephone facsimile machine; and 

16 (ii) without limitation, any service 

17 that enables real-time, two-way voice com18 munications, including any service that re19 quires internet protocol-compatible cus20 tomer premises equipment (commonly 

21 known as ‘‘CPE’’) and permits out-bound 

22 calling, whether or not the service is one23 way or two-way voice over internet pro24 tocol. 

Æ 


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