Alaska joins 48 attorneys general saying the FCC's robocall list is too easy to get onto

Alaska's acting attorney general and 48 others told federal regulators this week that the list meant to keep bad actors off the nation's phone network lets them in too easily.

Every phone company that wants to carry calls in the U.S. has to file with the Federal Communications Commission's Robocall Mitigation Database, describing its business and what it does to stop illegal robocalls. Other carriers are supposed to accept calls only from companies on that list. It works something like a guest list for the phone network.

But bad actors can get on the list and stay there "with minimal effort and limited impediments," the Alaska Department of Law said in a release on the comments.

"Alaskans should be able to answer their phones without worrying about scammers on the other end," Acting Attorney General Cori Mills said.

The FCC proposed in September to tighten the list by checking new filers more closely, catching companies that don't comply, removing them faster and keeping them from slipping back on. Its comment period closed Monday, and it hasn't adopted the rules.

The attorneys general, a bipartisan group, want the FCC to adopt those rules as soon as possible and go further. They asked it to hold phone companies responsible for anything filed on their behalf, require more disclosures, make past filings public and require companies to notify their customers and other carriers of FCC orders.

The changes are aimed at keeping bad actors and noncompliant phone companies out of the database. They wouldn't stop campaign calls that follow the rules. Political calls aren't covered by the national Do Not Call list, though prerecorded political calls to cellphones require the person's prior consent, according to an FCC advisory.

Per person, Alaska filed more senior fraud complaints with the FBI than any other state in 2024, and older Alaskans lost $8.17 million to fraud that year, mostly to tech support scams that can start with a phone call. In September, Matanuska Electric Association warned members about callers who posed as the co-op, knew some members' account numbers and threatened to shut off their power.

Mills is part of a multistate task force that sent warning letters to 37 phone companies in 2025 under what it called Operation Robocall Roundup. The FCC later took enforcement action against at least 16 of them, the Department of Law said.