The U.S. Supreme Court denied nonprofit Patriotic Veterans, Inc.’s petition for review of Indiana’s ban on the use of technology that automatically dials residential phone numbers and plays prerecorded messages. Patriotic Veterans, based in Illinois, uses this “robocall” technology to disseminate pre-recorded messages about political candidates’ positions on issues affecting veterans.  In 2010, however, the

Last week, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit upheld an Indiana statute banning robocalls, concluding that the statute was evenly applied in an effort to prohibit unsolicited calls made without a recipient’s consent regardless of the content of the message or the identity of the caller. Patriotic Veterans, Inc. brought suit arguing

Last week, the Federal Trade Commission (“FTC”) settled a claim against the Consumer Education Group for $100,000 regarding alleged violations of the FTC’s Telemarketing Sales Rule (“TSR”) and Section 5(a) of the FTC Act. The FTC alleged that Consumer Education Group made millions of illegal telemarketing calls, including unlawful robocalls, to consumers in an effort

The FCC is asking for comments on a letter it received from the National Association of Attorneys General that seeks out the Commission’s opinion on the legality of telephone carriers implementing call-blocking technology to reduce the amount of unwanted telemarketing calls. If your company engages in marketing over the telephone or uses it to regularly conduct business with customers, you may want to consider getting involved. Comments are due December 24, 2014, and reply comments are due January 8, 2015. For more on this, please read the latest post on our Global Regulatory Enforcement Law Blog.
Continue Reading FCC Rings the Bell for Public Comments Regarding Robocalls and Call-Blocking