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WASHINGTON 鈥� A bipartisan bill that would help in the fight against the and scams has been reintroduced in the U.S. Senate.

Sens. John Thune, R-S.D., and Edward Markey, D-Mass., who are both on the Senate Commerce committee, said the bill would give regulators more time to find scammers, increases penalties for those caught and asks phone carriers to adopt call authentication technologies.

"Robocall scams are more than just a nuisance to folks 鈥� they鈥檙e a shameful tactic to prey on the vulnerable," Thune said in a statement. 鈥淭he TRACED Act holds those people who participate in robocall scams and intentionally violate telemarketing laws accountable and does more to proactively protect consumers who are potential victims of these bad actors.鈥�

Markey added that the bill would help achieve the simple formula needed: call authentication, blocking and enforcement.

In a story last month, North Dakota Attorney General Wayne Stenehjem said the best thing for people to do when they don't recognize a number is to not even answer the calls.

Stenehjem said the No. 1 complaint his office receives is the growing number of scams and robocalls.

Robocalls tracked across the country have doubled in the past two years, according to the website YouMail.com, a California-based company that also tracks robocalls by city and area code.

The number of spam calls will grow from 30 percent of all phone calls last year to 42 percent or maybe even higher early this year, according to Thune. The TRACED Act would give the FCC more flexibility to enforce rules in the short term, while starting consultations on international cooperation as many of the calls are believed to come from overseas.

The Federal Communications Commission receives about 200,000 complaints each year about unwanted calls. The Federal Trade Commission reports it received more than 4 million complaints or about 400,000 a day last year.

Automated calls using prerecorded messages are legal only for things like school alerts, flight cancellations, credit card fraud notices, pitches by political candidates and medical appointment reminders. A company that makes such calls to sell products and services is not legal, according to the federal agencies.

The bill would:

• Give the Federal Communications Commission the authority to levy civil fines of up to $10,000 per call on people who intentionally flout telemarketing restrictions.
  
• Extends the time for FCC to catch and take action against violations from one to three years after a robocall is placed. The FCC has told the Senate committee that more time would improve enforcement against violators.
  
• Requires phone providers to adopt the call authentication technologies, enabling a carrier to verify that incoming calls are legitimate before they reach consumers' phones.
  
• Brings together the Department of Justice, FCC, Federal Trade Commission, Department of Commerce, Department of State, Department of Homeland Security, the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau and other relevant federal agencies, as well as state attorneys general, to identify and report to Congress on improving deterrence and criminal prosecution at the federal and state level of robocall scams.