Ed Markey: “I rise in support of the TRACED Act, a piece of legislation that will help all Americans deal with the epidemic of…”

“I rise in support of the TRACED Act, a piece of legislation that will help all Americans deal with the epidemic of robocalls, which afflicts them and their families every single day of the year. I thank Chairman Wicker for all of his assistance in moving this legislation expeditiously through the legislative process. I thank my partner, Senator Thune from South Dakota. He and I have worked very hard to reach this moment where Democrats and Republicans can come together on an issue, which we all agree is something that we have to address in a very serious way. So this question of robocalls and their role in American society, well, it is a daily deluge of calls that Americans experience. It is more than a nuisance in 2019. It is a consumer protection crisis. Americans across the country face an epidemic of robocalls bombarding landlines and mobile phones. While our phones were once a reliable means of communication, they have been turned against us and are now mechanisms for scammers and fraudsters who wish to do us harm. The numbers are staggering. In 2018, consumers received an estimated 48 billion robocalls--18 billion more than in 2017. That is 131 million robocalls per day--more than 5 million calls an hour, more than 1,000 calls per second in the United States, and nearly 500 million robocalls to Massachusetts residents alone. The reality is that we no longer have confidence in our phones.…”