Have you ever picked up your phone, only to see the "SPAM likely" warning?
This label is designated by the telephone carrier, in an attempt to protect people from robocalls and potential fraud. Common triggers include calls originating from multiple locations (perhaps you have a variety of local numbers) or high-volume activity without connections. These activities are certainly not fraudulent, yet, when viewed at the network level, such events appear similar to illegal robocalling activities, so your call is flagged and goes straight to your client's voicemail.
Let's go over the basics of the SPAM label and how you can avoid being flagged as a "SPAM likely" caller.
Who does this apply to?
All American and Canadian Dialpad Connect, Dialpad Meetings, Dialpad Sell, and Dialpad Support customers.
Why are my calls getting flagged?
On March 31, 2020, the FCC issued a mandate known as STIR/SHAKEN to combat spoofed calls. In conjunction with this mandate, each mobile carrier has implemented its own unique plan, and set of perimeters, to determine if calls are spoofed or spam. The networks have your client's best interest at heart, but unfortunately for businesses, it means that there can sometimes be false labeling.
The following 3 scenarios can trigger a call as "SPAM Likely"
The outbound call does not have attestation level “A” (STIR/SHAKEN)
Crowdsourcing where mobile recipients have marked the call as spam
A "suspicious" call pattern:
The phone number was recently ported
The company has calls originating from multiple locations
A high volume of outbound call activity without connections
Specific timing of calls
Note
Each mobile carrier and landline provider has their own methods for determining if a call is deemed "spam likely". These algorithms are not published (to ensure they are not hacked), though Dialpad has noticed that the algorithms have become much more sensitive since June 2022.
How do I prevent being flagged as a spam caller?
For American and Canadian users, we encourage you to register your numbers with your Analytic Providers, as well as the Carriers and Databases.
Click the links below to connect with the spam departments of the most popular North American carriers.
AT&T (Hiya)
T-Mobile (First Orion)
Sprint & US Cellular (TNS)
Additionally, First Orion and Hiya validate that you are a legitimate business and verify your calling numbers.
Note
If you would like to add another level of prevention, you can register your numbers as legitimate use cases by signing up with the Free Caller Registry portal. Major North American mobile carriers (such as T-Mobile, AT&T, and Verizon) work with their partnered Analytics Engines to allow callers to register their traffic within their systems simultaneously.
What is Dialpad doing about it?
Dialpad validates your phone numbers in conjunction with the STIR/SHAKEN call authentication standards, ensuring they have attestation level “A”.
This means your outbound phone call is verified using our digital certificates, and your account details will be associated with the call.
Our registration process doesn’t guarantee that your calls won’t ever be blocked or labeled, however, it is intended to greatly reduce the risk of it happening.