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US Judge Bars Unauthorized Sales of Phone Records
The Register delivers the good news that a US federal judge had slapped down the practice of pretexting and ordered a Wyoming company to pay almost $200,000; AccuSearch was also permanently barred from selling individuals' phone records without their permission. The FTC had filed suit in 2006 against the company and four others. AccuSearch had advertised a service that made phone records of any individual available for a fee. The current article makes no mention of whatever became of the other four accused data brokers.
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The company, AccuSearch, was calling up phone companies and pretending to be certain persons in order to gain their account information. They then sold the relevant information to an interested third party. The private firm was misrepresenting itself in order to gain sensitive information.
"FTC attorneys argued that using false pretenses, fraudulent statements and fraudulent or stolen documents to induce carriers to disclose records was illegal."
So, they didn't need a warrant because they were pretending to be a customer trying to access their account records.