On Thursday, the US Federal Trade Commission (FTC) announced robocall crackdown-contest - the Robocall Challenge - for the public; and will hand out a cash award of $50,000 to anybody who can come up with effective measures for the elimination of the menacing telemarketing robocall.

Looking for an effective kill-switch for the spammy pre-recorded messages - which the agency outlawed in 2009 -, the contest announced by FTC is an indication that the agency is apparently going all out to wipe out telephonic spam for all time.

The Robocall Challenge has been announced with the aim of checking the skyrocketing rise in the number of robocalls; especially with the statistics revealing that the complaints about automated calls had touched a disquieting figure of 212,000 in April 2011, vis-a-vis the October 2010 figure of 65,000.

The FTC said in its `Robocall Challenge' announcement that all adult US citizens can participate in the contest; with there being no restriction on the number of entries per person. The applications for the contest can be submitted from between October 25 and January 17; and the winners will be announced in April 2013.

Noting that the contest marks FTC's attempts "to tap into the genius and technical expertise among the public," David Vladeck - director of the Bureau of Consumer Protection at the agency - said: "We think this will be an effective approach in the case of robocalls because the winner of our challenge will become a national hero."