Sprint on Wednesday announced an expansion of its battle against robocalls through a new partnership with Transaction Network Services (TNS) subsidiary Cequint.
According to Sprint, the carrier will work with Cequint to develop “enhance Caller ID solutions” that will prevent spam calls from reaching its customers. The solution is expected to be integrated into Sprint’s service later this year, the company said.
“We are delighted to be working with Sprint in bringing to market an innovative solution that helps protect subscribers from nuisance calls,” TNS CEO Mike Keegan said. “We are taking a unique approach with our solution by directly leveraging data and network intelligence to identify a higher percentage of nuisance callers, giving subscribers a better way to take control of the calling experience.”
The move comes less than a month after Sprint joined the newly formed Robocall Strike Force alongside its fellow tier-1 peers, handset makers and other industry partners. Chaired by AT&T CEO Randall Stephenson, the group has committed to develop and implement solutions to stop unwanted calls from reaching consumers.
The group began working on a remedy in August and said it plans to report back to the FCC on October 19 with an update on its progress.
According to the most recent statistics from YouMail’s Robocall Index, an estimated 2.64 billion robocalls were made in August 2016. The Index indicated that figure was up nine percent from the number of robocalls made in July.
Out of the top 10 robocall numbers, nine were from collection agencies for credit card, medical, bank, retail and student loan debt. The U.S. cities most impacted by robocalls in August include Atlanta, Ga.’s 404 area code, with an estimated 49.4 million calls received; Houston, Texas’ 832 area code, with an estimated 41.8 million calls; and Dallas, Texas’ 214 area code with an estimated 39.5 million robocalls.