The United States Federal Communications Commission (or FCC, for short) has been discussing what to do about the increasingly-annoying problem of robocalling for a while. Today it unanimously passed a ruling that gives the green light for carriers to block unwanted robocalls by default.
An official press statement reads, "the Commission approved a Declaratory Ruling to affirm that voice service providers may, as the default, block unwanted calls based on reasonable call analytics, as long as their customers are informed and have the opportunity to opt out of the blocking."
The ruling also encourages carriers to let customers block calls from any number that does not appear on the person's contact list or is in another whitelist.
Carriers are not legally required to block robocolling by default, or provide the service for free. Verizon has already spoke in support of the ruling, saying in a press release, "As we continue to evolve the [Call Filter service], we intend to take advantage of the new flexibility the FCC is giving us."