TJ! Are you there? Question?
Complaint
coccisejustice
Country: United States
In regards to B2B Voice Broadcasting and friends.
http://www.ftc.gov/os/caselist/0923174/120224ebersolecmpt.pdf
The two week time frame you mentioned back a while ago must be close to up by now?
Do you know if that info about the other "clients" or "Private Label" users of the "robo-call" service will be made public? And where? On the FTC site?
thanks!
http://www.ftc.gov/os/caselist/0923174/120224ebersolecmpt.pdf
The two week time frame you mentioned back a while ago must be close to up by now?
Do you know if that info about the other "clients" or "Private Label" users of the "robo-call" service will be made public? And where? On the FTC site?
thanks!
Comments
I have no direct information other than what I noticed in the stipulated judgement and permanent injunction.
http://www.ftc.gov/os/caselist/0923174/120229ebersolestip.pdf
"...
B. Defendants shall, within ten (10) days of the date of this Order, review all the messages
that subscribers deliver with the assistance of Defendants or their Representatives and, for
each subscriber that delivers a message to businesses or consumers that promotes the
purchase of goods or services or solicits charitable contributions, Defendants or their
Representatives shall, within thirty (30) days of the ently of this Order:
1. Provide the subscriber with: (i) a copy of this Order, including Appendix A; and
(ii) a written notice stating that the use of Defendants' services to cause the
initiation of telephone calls that do not comply with this Order will result in
immediate termination of services; and
2. Obtain from each such subscriber a signed and dated statement acknowledging
receipt of this Order and the written notice concerning immediate termination of
servlces.
C. Prior to commencing services that assist subscribers or prospective subscribers in
delivering a message to businesses or consumers that was not reviewed under
Subparagraph B, Defendants shall review the message and, if the message promotes the
purchase of goods or services or solicits charitable contributions and the subscriber or
proposed subscriber seeking to deliver the messages has not previously provided a
statement acknowledging receipt of this Order, Defendants or their Representatives shall:
1. Provide each such subscriber or prospective subscriber with: (i) a copy of this
Order, including Appendix A; and (ii) a written notice stating that the use of
Defendants' services to cause the initiation of telephone calls that do not comply
with this Order will result in immediate termination of services; and
2. Obtain from each such subscriber or prospective subscriber a signed and dated'
statement acknowledging receipt of this Order and the written notice concerning
immediate termination of services.
D. Defendants shall:
Page 11 of 20
Case 3:12-cv-00105-LRH -VPC Document 4 Filed 02/29/12 Page 12 of 34
1. Terminate services to any subscriber immediately upon discovering that a
subscriber has used the services of Defendants or their Representatives to initiate
or cause the initiation of telephone calls that do not comply with this Order;
2. Refuse to provide services to any prospective subscriber if such services would
assist or support the initiation of telephone calls that do not comply with this
Order; and
3. Provide a copy of this Order (including Appendix A) to any person that purchases
the right to use software to initiate telephone calls to deliver prerecorded messages
and receives no other good or service from Defendants.
..."
The court injunction required that notice of the injunction be passed through to all clients. Not clear whether these confirmations of receipt by clients must be passed back to FTC, but they must maintain business records and allow FTC to audit them.
Although they now have a $2Million suspended judgement hanging over them, the injunction still treats them as if they are some sort of legitimate business. Looks like they set up this intermediary to allow third parties to use them as a "service", allowing each to hide behind the other while denying responsibility.
They all knew what they were doing, and how they intended to get away with it.
Even though FTC has apparently settled with this and a couple similar robocall violators, complaints on this site have shown an abrupt INCREASE over the last 2 months. In addition, consumers are reporting that the callers aren't even pretending they will remove consumers from their call lists, but are now saying, "Tough sh*t, we'll keep callilng you and there is nothing you can do about it."
FTC should be seeing similar complaint increases, with the same names and fake phone numbers showing up.
Whether this is one of the robocallers already subject to an injunction, or just a response to other robocallers to take advantage of the confusion, is not clear. Current strategy appears to be to use fake caller id phone numbers, and immediately hang up if consumers respond in any way that hints they are not suckers. They know people are looking for them.
They should be traceable both through the phone systems, and through the VISA and MasterCard charges, but that requires viewing this as an organized racket with multiple parties coordinating their activities, rather than just pursuing the robocaller part of the scheme. It's all part of a larger scheme to push fraudulent charges through the payment processsing system. If you don't go after the money, the money stream will just drive future phone system misuse further off-shore.
The lynch-pin is VISA and MasterCard, or possibly the VoIP carriers.
Otherwise, you are just playing wack-a-mole with shell corps.
Here's a Feb/March facebook report,
When discussing an individual “cardholder service”, it seems there are usually two larger parts of each “Voice service/client“. One is “voice broadcasting”, voice marketing, Act, Bmc, V3 Software, i.e.
http://www.ftc.gov/os/caselist/0923174/120224ebersolecmpt.pdf
And the other is their “client” or “Private Label” supposedly selling a “Product” or Service”. Seems “when the “s**t hits the fan” , they both point the finger at the other, as the bad guy (or another similarly named “company“). Each “domestic LLC, or Inc. seems to operate one or more “foreign for profit business entities”, or also referred to as an “offshore foreign shell company”. The U.S. Secret Service has jurisdiction over the foreign entity”, at least at first, it seems, until the FTC takes action.
Now, this is where the really weird stuff begins.
Ambrosia Wed Design seems to be the anomaly to the usual “third party debt collector” front company. Several “companies” where requested their Do Not call Policies.
Nothing has ever been received. It’s simply not enforced (for an individual) by the FTC under TCPA laws. Here’s what the illusive document supposedly looks like.
http://b2bvb.com/compliance/B2BVB_Business_Policy.pdf
The “third party debt collector front company” will claim they don’t, nor even have the resources to offer “debt reduction, debt consolidation. They tell the AG office- all calls are lawful under FDCPA debt collection laws. Do Not Call does not apply to them?
But their “affiliates” are always “Capital” this or “Financial” that, “foreign for profit business entities“. Further, the “owner” is often his own “Agent of Process” of both foreign and domestic “affiliates“. How can that possibly be legal? They cant be properly “served” on a fictitious “ foreign entity address/location.
That’s all I can look up for now, anyone got anything else?
They aren't collecting on any debt assigned to them or owned by them, they don't claim they are calling "to collect a debt and any information may be used for that purpose", they don't disclose their true name on request, and they don't even demand payment for any particular "debt" owed to any particular "creditor", etc.
So they aren't slipping through TCPA through some FDCPA loophole,. They are just blatantly violating TCPA, hiding their identities and blowing smoke. That's why their caller id phone numbers are fake, and they hang up the moment the call doesn't progress toward their con.
Deception through confusion, with denial of all information as the first barrier.
Remember, Denial and Deception practically always go together.
But just go and directly question one of them!
It's always "some one else is using our name, and swear their "finacial advisors" strickly obey FDCPA!
But question the AG office about the Capital/Financial shell, and its TCPA!
Now what does a "third party debt collection agency" do with a "financial instituition" anyway?!?
Not only do they attempt to deceive in what they say, they deceive by denying the deception, to maximally interfere with penetrating the deception.
Confusion is a form of deception, with the advantage of deniability.
It's the easiest and safest way to lie.
It seemed logical that it falls between the cracks.
And what about the Corporation Commission?
These criminals dont even sign their real names!!
Does the Commission even pay attention to who's starting what "company"???
They call to "lower your interest rates", and they are clearly violating TCPA, so they throw "debt collection" at any government employee dumb enough to be fooled. It doesn't make it so, and it's not even falling through the cracks. It's just a lie, nothing more, but it puts enough extra work ahead of a lawsuit that the government has to consider where to spend its efforts. Uncertainty and deniability, just the possibility it's only legal but shady ("plausibly deniable") shifts the cost/benefit calculation in the mind of the investigator, as the crooks intended.
FTC WILL have to deal with it, if only because the damage to the functioning of the telephone system is startging to be a problem. Or maybe Verizon or ATT will sue, since they also have the technology to track it to its source. They have sued eggregious abusers of autodialing in the past, for choking their networks. Or the problem will have to be pushed back onto the enablers, the VoIP telecoms, requiring that they be able to identify every call they pass back to the source, their customer.
The problems with enforcing reliable identification of those setting up these corporations or LLC is another problem. You'd think just notarization would solve it. Basically the same issue shows up in the mortgage foreclosure robosigning, or debt collection affidavits signed by "dead people" (see "Kunkle affidavit") We rely to some degree on the system not being gamed, even have penalties for perjury, but if that is your goal, you can do it anyway, by making it look like an "accident". Costs nothing, because it won't likely be worth it for anyone to piece the whole puzzle together, and when the fraud is blatant, everyone knows there will be nothing to grab anyway.
Calls can't be trusted to be from who they claim, but they never could. What is changing is the shear volume of fraudulent calling, and this is driven by price, which opens up the tactic to massive expansion for even marginal gains.
Just do the math, figure the costs, the risks, and how many people you have to call to find enough suckers. If the return is there, someone will try it.
A technical solution isn't difficult. Blocking of problem numbers is no longer enough, as that is easily defeated by the numerous "local" numbers dished out with VoIP. (Recent smartphone apps only block "known" numbers, even if they update them.) In fact a solution's been available for land lines for years, from before the Do Not Call law went into effect, just not through any of the phone company "privacy manager" services.
Several boxes have been on the market for screening callers, easily blocking autodialers unable to punch in verbal "ring" codes, and acting much like the "Captcha" human gateways. Make that available on ANY major network, and the others would have to follow. End of autodialing, including robodialers. You want to reach anyone, you better have a person on the line when it first rings, or you aren't getting through.
http://bottomline.msnbc.msn.com/_news/2012/03 ... n-nigerian-scam
"Feds sue AT&T for role in Nigerian scamBy Martha C. White
The Department of Justice announced a lawsuit against AT&T, charging that the telecom giant looked the other way while Nigerian scam artists exploited its call-assist service for the hearing impaired — and then turned around and billed the FCC for the calls.
IP Relay service, offered by AT&T as well as other carriers, is designed to assist hearing-impaired callers: They type their correspondence, and an operator reads it aloud to the call recipient. The caller doesn't have to pay for this service, but the carrier bills the FCC roughly $1.30 a minute to provide the operator-assisted communication.
Criminals — primarily located in Nigeria, according to the Wall Street Journal — exploited this system to order merchandise from U.S. retailers using stolen credit card numbers.
Since 2009, the FCC has required carriers to verify that these IP Relay connections originate domestically to prevent scam artists overseas from taking advantage of the system. In its complaint, the Justice Department charged that AT&T deliberately put loopholes in its verification process so it could continue taking the calls and earning millions of dollars in payments from the FCC. The DOJ estimates that as much as 95 percent of AT&T's IP Relay revenue came from fraudulent use of the system by foreign criminals.
..."