Senator Charles Schumer is introducing legislation to combat robocalls from bill collectors, politicians and other sources.
Schumer said on Sunday that the legislation would require both mobile and landline service providers to offer a free service to block these type of calls.
Another companion bill was introduced by Rep. Jackie Speier in the House of Representatives.
Schumer said "despite the existing ‘Do Not Call’ registry, the robocall problem has returned in a serious way. It’s an epidemic that we’ve got to stop. Now is the time for phone carriers to answer the call and free consumers of these dreaded robocalls.”
Schumer added that robocalls are identifiable and that the blocking services would work like email spam filters.
According to voicemail provider YouMail Inc., there were nearly 50 million robocalls made to two New York City area codes in April.
