Title: STOP Robocalls Act
Policy area: Science, Technology, Communications

Summary:
Support Tools to Obliterate Pesky Robocalls Act or the STOP Robocalls Act
This bill provides measures to eliminate unlawful robocalls.
Specifically, the bill requires the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) to establish a streamlined process whereby a private entity may voluntarily share information about unlawful robocalls or text messages and unlawful caller identification spoofing. In addition, the bill authorizes a telecommunications company to provide a free, opt-in robocall blocking service to its customers.
The FCC must also study and report on whether a Voice Over Internet Protocol service should be required to provide the FCC with its contact information and retain records of all calls transmitted over the service.

[Congressional Bills 116th Congress]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office]
[H.R. 2386 Introduced in House (IH)]

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116th CONGRESS
  1st Session
                                H. R. 2386

  To amend the Communications Act of 1934 to provide for information 
 sharing regarding robocall and spoofing violations, to authorize the 
    provision of a robocall blocking service with opt-out customer 
 approval, and to provide for a study on information requirements for 
                    certain VoIP service providers.


_______________________________________________________________________


                    IN THE HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES

                             April 29, 2019

   Mr. Latta (for himself and Mr. Michael F. Doyle of Pennsylvania) 
 introduced the following bill; which was referred to the Committee on 
                          Energy and Commerce

_______________________________________________________________________

                                 A BILL


 
  To amend the Communications Act of 1934 to provide for information 
 sharing regarding robocall and spoofing violations, to authorize the 
    provision of a robocall blocking service with opt-out customer 
 approval, and to provide for a study on information requirements for 
                    certain VoIP service providers.

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

SECTION 1. SHORT TITLE.

    This Act may be cited as the ``Support Tools to Obliterate Pesky 
Robocalls Act'' or the ``STOP Robocalls Act''.

SEC. 2. INFORMATION SHARING REGARDING ROBOCALL AND SPOOFING VIOLATIONS.

    Section 227 of the Communications Act of 1934 (47 U.S.C. 227) is 
amended by adding at the end the following:
    ``(i) Information Sharing.--Not later than 18 months after the date 
of the enactment of this subsection, the Commission shall promulgate 
regulations to establish a process that streamlines the ways in which a 
private entity may voluntarily share with the Commission information 
relating to--
            ``(1) a call made or a text message sent in violation of 
        subsection (b); or
            ``(2) a call or text message for which misleading or 
        inaccurate caller identification information was caused to be 
        transmitted in violation of subsection (e).''.

SEC. 3. ROBOCALL BLOCKING SERVICE WITH OPT-OUT CUSTOMER APPROVAL.

    Section 227 of the Communications Act of 1934 (47 U.S.C. 227), as 
amended by section 2, is further amended by adding at the end the 
following:
    ``(j) Robocall Blocking Service With Opt-Out Customer Approval.--
            ``(1) In general.--A voice service provider may provide a 
        robocall blocking service to a customer on an informed opt-out 
        basis if the provider does not charge a fee in exchange for 
        such service.
            ``(2) Rules of construction.--
                    ``(A) Informed opt-in basis.--Nothing in this 
                subsection shall be construed to prohibit a voice 
                service provider from providing a robocall blocking 
                service to customers on an informed opt-in basis, 
                whether or not in exchange for a fee.
                    ``(B) Blocking calls without customer consent.--
                Nothing in this subsection shall be construed to 
                prohibit a voice service provider from blocking calls 
                without customer consent as provided by rule or order 
                of the Commission.
            ``(3) Definitions.--In this subsection:
                    ``(A) Robocall blocking service.--The term 
                `robocall blocking service' means a service or 
                technology that enables a voice service customer to 
                avoid receiving calls made in violation of subsection 
                (b).
                    ``(B) Voice service.--The term `voice service' has 
                the meaning given such term in subsection (e)(8). This 
                subparagraph shall apply before the effective date of 
                the amendment made to such subsection by subparagraph 
                (C) of section 503(a)(2) of division P of the 
                Consolidated Appropriations Act, 2018 (Public Law 115-
                141) as if such amendment was already in effect.''.

SEC. 4. STUDY ON INFORMATION REQUIREMENTS FOR CERTAIN VOIP SERVICE 
              PROVIDERS.

    (a) In General.--The Federal Communications Commission shall 
conduct a study regarding whether to require a provider of covered VoIP 
service to--
            (1) provide to the Commission contact information for such 
        provider and keep such information current; and
            (2) retain records relating to each call transmitted over 
        the covered VoIP service of such provider that are sufficient 
        to trace such call back to the source of such call.
    (b) Report to Congress.--Not later than 18 months after the date of 
the enactment of this Act, the Commission shall submit to Congress a 
report on the results of the study conducted under subsection (a).
    (c) Covered VoIP Service Defined.--In this section, the term 
``covered VoIP service'' means a service that--
            (1) is an interconnected VoIP service (as defined in 
        section 3 of the Communications Act of 1934 (47 U.S.C. 153)); 
        or
            (2) would be an interconnected VoIP service (as so defined) 
        except that the service permits users to terminate calls to the 
        public switched telephone network but does not permit users to 
        receive calls that originate on the public switched telephone 
        network.
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