The FCC wants the Robocall Mitigation Database to be a gatekeeper, not a registry

The FCC released a draft Further Notice of Proposed Rulemaking on July 1 proposing a substantial expansion of the Robocall Mitigation Database, teed up for the July open meeting. The CommLaw Group, in a detailed client advisory, reads the direction plainly: the Commission wants the RMD “to become less of a passive registry and more of an active gatekeeping, enforcement, and provider-vetting system.” (TransNexus flagged the coming vote.)

The reach is the story. The FNPRM signals a broad view of who counts as a “voice service provider” — information-service providers, CPaaS and UCaaS platforms, call centers, AI voice platforms, resellers, and MVNOs using NANP numbers from the likes of Twilio, Bandwidth, and Telnyx may all lose the “we’re just a platform” safe harbor. Parents, affiliates, and subsidiaries would file separately; third-party preparers would be named and filings signed by an officer under penalty of perjury; providers would certify 24-hour traceback response and a new “lack of candor” attestation; and STIR/SHAKEN exemption claims would have to cite a specific rule. It even probes numbering-resource disclosures, tying the RMD directly to the Commission’s KYC, Know Your Upstream Provider, and traceback work.

This is the RMD becoming infrastructure for identity and accountability across the voice network — get removed, and you are functionally cut off from U.S. call termination. For the synthesis beat, the throughline is worth marking: number access, upstream vetting, and mitigation certification are converging into one enforceable filing. Comments run 30 days after Federal Register publication; watch the Regulatory Watch dispatches as they land.