CRII: SaTC: Techniques for Measuring and Characterizing Robocalls

Abstract

Automated calls (often called "robocalls"), which may range in purpose from telemarketing to outright fraud, have reached epidemic proportions. While some robocalls are societally useful, there are plenty that are used for malicious purposes. This is particularly concerning because some scam calls steal millions of dollars annually, often from vulnerable populations including the elderly and recent immigrants. Policy mechanisms like the National Do Not Call Registry have failed to meaningfully stop these calls. Despite a clear need, the network security community currently lacks the infrastructure and techniques needed to provide insight into the scope of this problem, which prevents the development and scientific validation of effective solutions. This project is aimed at developing techniques to characterize and measure robocalls, which will lead to better defenses against scam calls for end users. The project will develop a new infrastructure to collect robocalls. This infrastructure will facilitate the development of new techniques to measure the impact of victim behaviors on robocallers, as well as comprehensive and systematic measurements of robocalling trends including geographic, network and temporal characteristics; common abuse trends; measurements of spoofing rates; and characterization of robocall campaigns. Such insights will lead to better detection and prevention of these calls.