'Stop scam calls:' What the federal government is doing to halt illegal robocalls

Federal authorities said they are ramping up their war on phone scammers with a new campaign intended to make it harder for fraudsters to contact everyday Americans.

Under the effort, known as Operation Stop Scam Calls, the Federal Trade Commission says it has already cracked down on five companies accused of scamming millions of Americans in robocall and telemarketing schemes, resulting in millions in fines and bans that forbid the companies from making similar calls in the future.

"We are taking action against those who trick people into phony consent to receive these calls and those who make it easy and cheap to place these calls," said Samuel Levine, the FTC’s Bureau of Consumer Protection director, at a news conference Tuesday in Chicago. "The FTC and its law enforcement partners will not rest in the fight against illegal telemarketing."

The five companies face proposed penalties totaling nearly $18 million and robocall bans, the FTC said. The companies are accused of "distributing or assisting the distribution of illegal telemarketing calls" to consumer nationwide.

What are scam calls?

More than 33 million scam robocalls a day are made to Americans, according to the National Consumer Law Center and Electronic Privacy Information Center. Scam calls typically target the most vulnerable Americans and include Social Security Administration fraud against seniors. Nearly $30 billion was stolen from Americans through scam calls in 2021, the organizations said.

The FTC and authorities said they hope to stop "lead-generation consent farms" that often trick consumers by offering free prizes, rewards or even potential job leads if they provide their personal information. That "consent," the FTC said, can then be sold to telemarketers and lead to receiving unwanted robocalls.

The FTC said it has handled 167 such cases and added it "won’t stop until companies that violate the FTC Act and the Telemarking Sales Rule hang up once and for all." Court rulings have ordered violators to pay more than $2 billion and the FTC has collected more than $394 million, with most of the money refunded to defrauded consumers.

What companies are accused of unlawful calls?

The effort involves more than 100 federal and state law enforcement authorities, including the attorneys general of all 50 states and Washington, D.C.

One New Jersey-based company, Vision Solar is accused of using multiple company names to make unlawful telemarketing calls to Arizona residents.

"Vision Solar’s telemarketers at times falsely claimed to be affiliated with a utility company or government agency and misrepresented the amount of money that consumers could expect to save on their energy bills by buying and installing solar panels on their homes," according to the FTC complaint.

Under a proposed court order, the company cannot make those telemarketing claims and must pay a $13.8 million penalty.

Another company, New York City-based Fluent, tricked consumers into possible employment opportunities such as a UPS job interview or free items including a $1,000 Walmart gift card, the FTC said. Fluent sold more than 620 million telemarketing leads to other companies, violating several federal laws. Fluent agreed to a $2.5 million civil fine and a robocall ban, authorities said.

Two other companies were ordered to pay nearly $1.4 million in penalties, but most will not likely be fully paid because they can't afford it, the FTC said. No penalty amount has been proposed yet for a fifth company.

How can you get on the Do Not Call Registry?

More than 2 million consumer complaints have been filed in the past eight years with the Consumer Help Center from the Federal Communications Commission, which handles a wide range of telecommunications service and billing issues.

Unwanted calls are the single largest source for those complaints. At least 55% of all the reports filed to the FCC are the result of unwanted calls, including telemarketing and robocalls, according to a USA TODAY analysis.

The FTC's Do Not Call Registry allows users to register their phone numbers to stop sales calls from real companies. More than 240 million active numbers are on the registry.

Ohio Attorney General Dave Yost, a Republican, has filed multiple lawsuits against illegal robocalls and joined other attorneys general to form a bipartisan national Anti-Robocall Litigation Task Force. Yost said Tuesday that the efforts to stop phone scammers will help authorities "outwit and defeat these perpetrators" in their own arena.

"Our secret weapon is consumers – whom we urge to continue reporting illicit robocalls, so we can sever these unwanted illegal robocallers’ connection once and for all," Yost said in a press statement.

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This article originally appeared on USA TODAY: Scam calls? Federal government vows to stop illegal robocalls