One Eye Became the First Company Hit With an FCC RoboBlocking Order

On May 11, 2023, the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) issued its first ever RoboBlocking order. The target was One Eye LLC, an international gateway provider. Gateway providers are the on-ramps for calls coming into U.S. phone networks from overseas.

So what happened?

According to the FCC, the robocalls at issue impersonated a major financial institution. They told people about "preauthorized order[s]" placed in their names. The script never said what the order was for or how it was placed.

The USTelecom Industry Traceback Group (ITG) looked at prerecorded calls flagged by Bank of America and Verizon between September 14 and November 1, 2022. The ITG found that the calls started overseas and that One Eye was the gateway provider. One Eye didn't respond to those tracebacks.

Then the FCC walked through its process step by step:

• October 21, 2021: A cease-and-desist letter went to PZ/Illum Telecommunication. The FCC says One Eye was apparently created by PZ/Illum's CEO after that enforcement.
• February 15, 2023: The FCC sent One Eye a Notification of Suspected Illegal Traffic. It also issued a notice encouraging other providers to refrain from carrying One Eye's traffic. One Eye had until March 2 to investigate, block and report. It didn't respond.
• April 3, 2023: The FCC issued an Initial Determination Order. One Eye got 14 days to explain itself. Silence again.
• May 11, 2023: Final Determination Order. Every provider immediately downstream from One Eye had to block and stop accepting its traffic within 30 days.

Here's the thing ...

FCC Chairwoman Jessica Rosenworcel said: "This company, what's left of it, will now have a place in robocall history."

That's a pretty brutal line from a regulator. And it's earned. One Eye got a traceback, a letter, a notice, an initial order and a final order. It ignored every one.

The FCC's press release also said its February cease-and-desist letter made clear that One Eye's "attempts to evade enforcement by rebranding had not worked." Read that again. A new LLC name doesn't wipe the slate clean.

The tool here came from the FCC's Gateway Provider Order, adopted May 19, 2022. That order requires gateway providers to block illegal traffic when the FCC notifies them. If they don't, every carrier downstream has to cut them off.

And the states were watching too. The Florida Attorney General's office said in December 2022 that the Anti-Robocall Litigation Task Force had announced an investigation into One Eye. Indiana's Attorney General later listed a successful civil investigative demand enforcement against One Eye.

Why should you care?

If you carry international traffic, you're a gateway provider under FCC rules. You get 14 days to investigate a notice and report. Ignore it and you're off the network.

What to do this week

• Know if you're a gateway provider. If you take calls from foreign providers at U.S. facilities, you probably are.
• Answer every traceback. One Eye's silence started this whole thing.
• Don't buy traffic from rebrands. If a "new" carrier shares people with an old problem carrier, walk away.

That's it. Answer the mail.