Attorney General Mark Herring is working to stop illegal robocalls and spoofing.
Herring joins a bipartisan coalition of 34 attorneys general calling on the Federal Communications Commission to create new rules to allow telephone service providers to block more illegal robocalls being made to unsuspecting consumers in Virginia and across the country.
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The FCC says scammers have found ways to evade a call blocking order entered last year by the FCC.
Spoofing allows scammers to disguise their identities, making it difficult for law enforcement to crack down on them.
One tactic on the rise is “neighbor spoofing,” a technique that allows calls - no matter where they originate - to appear on a consumer’s caller ID as being made from a phone number that has the same local area code and first three digits as the consumer. This manipulation of caller ID information increases the likelihood that the person will answer the call.
In 2017, the Federal Trade Commission received 4.5 million illegal robocall complaints, which is 2.5 times more than in 2014.