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FCC Announces First Do-Not-Call Citation

Posted by michael on from the baby-steps dept.

An anonymous reader writes "The FCC will announce on Thursday December 18, its first enforcement action for violations of the new national Do-Not-Call list. The perp is a mortgage broker (big users of telemarketing, junk faxes, and spam) in California -- CPM Funding, Inc. No fines (yet) since the FCC can only impose fines on telemarketers after they have had one citation letter (which this is). If, perhaps, a common carrier was to violate however (can you say MCI, AT&T, etc) they can be fined up to $11,000 right off the bat.... no warnings. (The action against AT&T a couple of months ago was for other violations, not violating the new National DNC list.)"

5 of 31 comments (clear)

  1. Suing the local police? by ObviousGuy · · Score: 2, Interesting

    Would the police be excluded from soliciting for fundraisers? If not, why not?

    --
    I have been pwned because my /. password was too easy to guess.
    1. Re:Suing the local police? by redog · · Score: 2, Interesting

      I got a call from the Fraternal Order of Police just last night, this ws the first and only time I have ever asked them to "add me to your do not call list please" so I guess I will see how that goes.

  2. Merry Chrismas! by wowbagger · · Score: 4, Interesting

    This holiday season just keeps getting better and better - MS losing ("loosing" for those of you who learned to spell from /.) Office customers, SCO being told to put up or shut up, David Boies being up on possible ethics violations, Saddam Hussein in custody, RotK released, Athlon64 systems shipping, a spammer in Virginia being hit with felony spamming charges, now this.

    Thank you Santa!

    --
    www.eFax.com are spammers
  3. Hmm... by cperciva · · Score: 4, Interesting

    the FCC can only impose fines on telemarketers after they have had one citation letter

    Does that mean that telemarketers can harass people for two weeks, receive a citation letter, change names, and repeat the process ad infinitum?

    --
    Tarsnap: Online backups for the truly paranoid
  4. SMS/Premium rate spam squished by Bazzargh · · Score: 4, Interesting

    Somewhat relevant - a couple of months ago I got several SMS spams on my mobile advertising a premium rate phone service, which didn't list the call prices and looked dodgy anyway. I showed them to a friend who works in the mobile industry, who mentioned ICSTIS - they regulate premium rate services in the UK.

    I went to their website, read up on what they'd take action on, and filed a complaint.

    A month later, they got back to me to say that they had...
    1) stopped the service immediately as it looked like they were operating in breach of the code
    2) held an inquiry, decided that they were in breach of the code in lots of ways and passed judgment....
    3) ...banning them from operating a premium rate line for a year
    4) ...fining them 15000
    5) ...and getting them to pay back the money they'd made on calls to the service.

    w00t! Heck I know 15k isn't a lot but the scum were shut down. Nice to see the system work.

    -Baz