The U.S. Federal Trade Commission (FTC) has announced a nationwide operation targeting illegal telemarketing calls as well as taking action against activities that employ deceptive tactics to collect people’s phone numbers.
“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, director of the FTC’s Bureau of Consumer Protection, in an FTC news release on July 18.
According to the agency, “Today’s actions make clear that third-party lead generation for robocalls is illegal under the Telemarketing Sales Rule (TSR) and that the FTC and its partners are committed to stopping illegal calls by targeting anyone in the telemarketing ecosystem that assists and facilitates these calls, including VoIP service providers,” referring to voice over internet protocol….