Government is giving away $50,000 for answer to annoying robocall problem

Now that you've spent all that money on Black Friday and Cyber Monday,  how does $50,000 sound?

The Federal Trade Commission's Facebook page has been promoting a $50,000 competition announced last month.

Maybe you've heard of it? The government is giving away $50,000 if you come up with a way to stop those annoying robocalls.

You know, they're those automated telemarketing calls that are illegal unless you authorize them.

But who would want them, and making them illegal doesn't seem to stop these guys.

The FTC will judge your idea on the following: 50% on will it work, 25% is it easy to use, 25% can it be rolled out.

Hey, you can even get your winning idea, from other people's posts on Facebook.
 
You do see some complaining about the contest. "I don't understand this challenge. The technology has been around for years to block calls."

But there are also solutions from other Facebook posts. "Have the damn phone company send the real data on to the customer and not whatever the robo bot is programmed for. This should include name, number and address."

Waste of time? No way, I signed up using the name "Consumer Guy."

To help you, the FTC will release data from consumer complaints for the last few months.

You won't get names, but you will get information many others don't see.

The deadline is January 17th. You can sign up right here on the FTC page.

E-mail me with any scams you see or "like" my ABC15 Facebook page and tell me about them there.