Spam has taken over the realm of phone calls. Over half of all phone calls received today are uninvited spam. In America alone, citizens received nearly 46 billion robocalls in the year of 2020. That is over 175 million robocalls per day!  

The problem doesn’t only exist on the receiving end of the call; legitimate business calls suffer by proximity with these phone scams. Scammers can spoof real numbers to make their lies more convincing. To fight back, phone carriers established spam algorithms.  Unfortunately, said algorithms are flawed, as they are based on call volume, recipient complaints, and lead blocking. Now, over 90% of people don’t bother with calls from an unknown number.

Don’t give up on phone communication just yet, though. STIR/SHAKEN is here to restore trust in the communication method. In March of last year, the TRACED Act passed to require voice providers to implement a robocall mitigation program. 15 months later, the STIR/SHAKEN program came online to provide caller ID authentication and combat spoofing. All service providers are expected to follow the new standards.

Here’s how the new system works. Every time a business places an outbound call, the phone carrier checks their number for authentication. They can assign the call 1 of 3 ratings: full, meaning both number and customer are verified; partial, which says that the customer is verified but not their number; and gateway, in which the call origination is not authenticated. Once a rating has been assigned, the call is sent to its recipient. Caller ID shows whether the caller is verified or not. These attestation levels are meant to give higher trust to the right people.  

The benefits of the new system are many. Legitimate businesses can become verified, spoofed numbers will be traceable, and customers will know which calls are safe to pick up on. To further reduce the risk of having one’s business calling labelled spam, one can submit their FFC business profile for accreditation, avoid using their number for unverified purposes, reduce call volume per phone number, and use a mix of hot and cold leads to maximize responses.

PhoneBurner is a cloud based power dialer and sales acceleration platform. They fully support compliance with STIR/SHAKEN and ask for zero upfront fees or ongoing contracts. Getting started with PhoneBurner is easy, fast, and efficient. Their platform allows users to call with confidence post STIR/SHAKEN revolution.