If an AI robot calls your phone, U.S. Sen. John Curtis wants you to know it.
A new bill sponsored by Curtis and U.S. Sen. Richard Blumenthal, a Connecticut Democrat, would require that any robocalls or text messages made or sent using artificial intelligence must notify consumers that AI is being used.
The bill, called the Quashing Unwanted and Interruptive Electronic Telecommunications (QUIET) Act, would also enhance penalties for anyone using AI to impersonate a human with the intent to defraud or harm another person by aiming to double fines when AI is used as part of a scam.
“If a person making a robocall uses artificial intelligence to emulate a human being, such person shall disclose at the beginning of the call or text message the fact that artificial intelligence is being used,” the bill text provided by Curtis’s office reads.
The bill makes an exception for “a call made or text message sent using equipment that requires substantial human intervention to make or send the call or text message,” and a spokesperson for Curtis said the intention is to prevent the use of AI imitations of human voice when the person on the other end of the call believes they’re speaking to a human.
The spokesperson did not respond to a question about what the senator would consider “substantial” human intervention.
In a statement Thursday, Curtis said, “The innovation that comes with using artificial intelligence has the potential to bring incredible amounts of good to our lives, with the understanding that bad actors will and can take advantage of that.”
Older Americans, Curtis’s office noted in a release about the bill, are disproportionately targeted by robocall scams, and the AARP, a nonprofit advocating for the rights of older adults, is supporting the bill.
“Older adults should be able to answer the phone without fear of being scammed,” Bill Sweeney, the senior vice president of government affairs at AARP, said in a statement released by Curtis’s office. “But nearly half say they get scam calls almost every day, draining billions of dollars from people who can least afford it. The QUIET Act will crack down on criminals using AI to trick and defraud, giving older Americans stronger protections and greater peace of mind.”
According to Curtis’s office, 95% of U.S. adults ages 50 and over received scam or illegal robocalls in the past year, with two in five reporting they received such calls either daily or almost daily. And between 2020 and 2024, according to the Federal Trade Commission, the number of reports from older adults who lost $10,000 or more to a scam more than quadrupled, though the agency does not specify what portion of those calls used AI.
Curtis is not the first lawmaker to take aim at robocalls. In recent years, new policies like caller ID verification and autodialer restrictions have attempted to address the issue of rampant spam calls, but with little avail.
According to Politico, the number of robocalls jumped from about 30 billion per year to 50 billion per year in 2018 and hasn’t gone down since, as scammers find ways to outwit new policy measures designed to stop them.
Politicians, too, sometimes use robocalls and texts, and some attempts to rein in such techniques have raised concerns among lawmakers. An update to text message filtering on Apple devices, the National Republican Senatorial Committee said earlier this year, could cost the committee $25 million in text message fundraising.
Additionally, in recent months, many members of Congress have pivoted to telephone town halls, in part because they can “dial out” to constituents to bring people into the call. In the case of the teletown halls, however, the calls use a pre-recorded message before transitioning to the live event.
In some instances, however, AI bots have been used to recreate the voices of politicians, including a scam that involved the AI voice of Secretary of State Marco Rubio — a use of AI robocalling a Curtis staffer said the bill aims to ban.