RSSFTC Fines Six Companies Over Do Not Call Violations
By Ed Oswald | Published November 8, 2007, 12:58 PM
The Federal Trade Commission showed that it was serious about prosecuting those who did not follow the Do Not Call list, announcing six settlements totaling some $7.7 million in fines.
Since the law was enacted in 2003, the FTC has filed some 34 cases against violators, and nearly 134 million numbers have been placed on the list. Altogether some $16 million in penalties have been collected, the largest of which was a $5.3 million fine levied on DirecTV in 2005.
The FTC also recently announced that phone numbers placed on the list will not be removed after a five-year expiration date as recently announced. The final decision depends on whether Congress decides to make the list permanent.
Named in this most recent action are the following companies: Craftmatic, a $4.4 million fine; ADT Security and authorized dealers Alarm King and Direct Security, fines of $2 million, $20,000, and $25,000; Ameriquest Financial, $1 million; and Guardian Communications, $150,000.
Additionally, the FTC will also pursue charges against Global Mortgage Funding for its violations of the DNC list. That action will be assisted by the Justice Department, it said.
"By bringing enforcement actions, like those announced today, we will ensure that the small number of bad actors pay a price for not adhering to the law and respecting consumers' privacy requests," FTC Chairman Deborah Majoras said in a statement.
I hope they concentrate not just on easy targets like lawful companies(for the most part, that is), but on the harder-to-catch ones foisting malware and/or running financial scams...
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|great, now they need to go after all these damn credit people... freaking bots calling me all hours of the day and night offering me credit. I am on a do not call list you freaking morons, I shouldn't have to jump through hoops on your multi-layered bot to be removed from future calls >.< do not call means just that... DO NOT CALL :)
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|..and those freaktards at geico who will not stop spamming my (snail)mailbox.
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|Ha this is great! When I first moved into my new condo, ADT called me every day for a week even though I have been on the DNC list since close to the beginning. And no, I moved only about 2 miles through town so my # and CO are the same.
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|Another way they can find your phone number and personal information is through the public access people search and marketing databases.
Check out UnlistAssist.com - they offer to take you off 40 of those lists!
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|FINALLY! Some snapback!
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|We also have a similar law in the UK - we simply register online with the TPS (Telephone Preference Service).
Not as good as we think though - we now receive sales call after sales call after sales call from Indian or Polish call centres who are outside the UK law.
Back to square one.
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|this is a great law that was established. I enroll people in this list almost daily at my work (with their consent) and love the fact that enrollment is so easy. # and email, confirm and done.
if only canadian lawmakers weren't so lazy we would have a version of this registry already.
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|Um...you might want to have a look here to find out some info and get started.
http://www.crtc.gc.ca/eng/INFO_SHT/t1022.htm
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|do not call me shocked that theyd ignore this...zing!
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|???
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