The FCC has issued a $300m fine to robocall scammers calling about your auto insurance, not that they'll ever collect it: "We take seriously our responsibility to protect consumers and the integrity of U.S. communications networks from the onslaught of these types of pernicious calls," FCC Enforcement Bureau Chief Loyaan A. Egal was quoted saying in a press release.
The Federal Communications Commission today issued a record-breaking $299,997,000 fine for auto warranty scam robocalls made by the largest illegal robocall operation the agency has ever investigated. An international network of companies violated federal statutes and the Commission's regulations when they executed a scheme to make more than five billion robocalls to more than 500 million phone numbers during a three-month span in 2021, including violating federal spoofing laws by using more than one million different caller ID numbers in an attempt to disguise the true origin of the robocalls and trick victims into answering the phone.
The enterprise violated a multitude of robocall prohibitions by making pre-recorded voice calls to mobile phones without prior express consent, placing telemarketing calls without written consent, dialing numbers included on the National Do Not Call Registry, failing to identify the caller at the start of the message, and failing to provide a call-back number that allowed consumers to opt out of future calls. The calls also violated spoofing laws by using misleading caller ID to disguise the enterprise's role and prompt consumers to answer.
The crooks at the heart of the scam were old hands, already banned from telemarketing.
Since at least 2018, this enterprise operated a complex scheme designed to facilitate the sale of vehicle service contracts under the false and misleading claim of selling auto warranties. Two of the central players of the operation, Roy M. Cox and Aaron Michael Jones, were under lifetime bans against making telemarketing calls following lawsuits by the Federal Trade Commission and State of Texas.
Previously: FCC fines Texas robocallers record $225m
