Legitimate callers from call centers will soon be identified by three-digit short numbers even when making commercial calls or sending promotional messages. This innovation arises from a proposal from AGCOM, theCommunications Regulatory Authorityand is designed to reduce aggressive telemarketing and be able to recognize at a glance who is contacting us. The idea is in fact to allow operators who act in compliance with the rules to use numbers already familiar to users, today reserved above all for customer assistance, also for teleselling and telemarketing. In this way it will be possible to distinguish with greater certainty a legitimate communication from a potentially fraudulent one, without having to appeal to one’s intuition or personal experience. The Authority announced that the trial had already started on 17 December and the consultation will last 45 days. After which the measure will become operational in all respects.
How AGCOM’s proposal to combat unwanted calls in Italy works
The consultation was launched on 17 December by the Authority’s Infrastructure and Networks Commission and concerns the possibility of using short numbers as calling or sender numbers for promotional activities. The measure was necessary due to the current context in which call centers operate, where persistent commercial calls are sometimes linked to fraud attempts. One of the most widespread techniques is the so-called CLI spoofing, an expression that indicates the falsification of the number displayed on the recipient’s phone: the caller masks their identity by making a credible Italian number appear, so as to increase the chances of a response and make it difficult to trace the real author of the call. This ploy also allows you to circumvent the rules on privacy and the public opposition register, the tool that allows citizens to oppose unwanted promotional calls.
In recent months the Authority has intervened decisively on this front by activating the so-called anti-spoofing filter. With specific resolutions it has imposed on operators the obligation to block illicit calls that simulate Italian fixed and mobile numbers which, in reality, come from abroad, also clarifying the control responsibilities when telephone traffic uses VoIP technologies, i.e. the transmission of voice via the Internet rather than traditional networks. These rules have been operational since 19 August for fixed numbers and from 19 November for mobile ones and have produced tangible results: millions of fraudulent calls were intercepted and blocked every day, allowing for the first time to objectively quantify the size of the phenomenon. Calls from roaming users, i.e. citizens who use their telephone abroad using foreign networks, are excluded from the block to avoid disruptions in service.
As often happens, however, illegal trafficking has adapted. A portion of the unwanted calls moved to foreign numbers realwhich cannot be blocked by AGCOM’s anti-spoofing filter. However, this has had an indirect effect: many users have learned to be more wary of numbers with foreign prefixes. To complete the framework of protections, the Authority now proposes to act on the recognizability of legal calls, offering regular operators and call centers the possibility of using three-digit Italian short numbers even when outgoing. This type of number sequences are not an absolute novelty: they are already used for assistance or information services and have the characteristic of being assigned and managed at a national level, therefore not replicable from abroad. In explaining the possible effectiveness of the measure, AGCOM reported:
Allowing the possibility that short numbers can be used for teleselling calls helps to create greater reliability and trust in users regarding the “calling” company (or sender in the case of messaging), as it allows companies to be more easily identified by their customers, thus reducing the risks of confusion of the caller’s identity, generated by the fraudulent or aggressive phenomena mentioned above. Furthermore, the short number cannot be replicated from abroad.
Basically, according to the Authority, seeing a short number appear would allow us users to immediately understand that the call comes from an identified person subject to Italian rules, reducing the confusion generated by the current confusion of existing numbers.
The opinion of consumer associations
What do consumer associations think about the new measure designed by AGCOM? Massimiliano Dona, president of the National Consumers Union, commented on the news as follows:
It’s certainly an improvement over the jungle of numbers currently used. It remains to be seen whether this is progress also with respect to the use of the single prefix equal for all, 0844, unfortunately not made mandatory by Law no. 5/2018 and, therefore, never applied. There are numerous limits that should be set. For example, that the 3-digit number used by a company should always be the same and dedicated exclusively to telemarketing and teleselling, to prevent the consumer from interpreting the call also as an assistance service. However, we will analyze the Authority’s proposal in detail and make our appropriate assessments, hoping that the timing for the entry into force of the new rules will be short.
Codacons, however, commented on the issue as follows in an official note:
Codacons is happy with the new measure being studied by AGCOM aimed at introducing short three-digit numbers in Italy as the calling number for phone calls and messages also intended for teleselling and telemarketing activities. This is a long-awaited measure that has been invoked several times by Codacons, which can make life easier for citizens. The use of short numbers for incoming calls will in fact allow users to immediately understand whether the call comes from their bank, their telephone company or their energy company, and will allow them to limit fraud and scams carried out through teleselling, increasing transparency in the sector.
