There seems to be a resurrection of email chains claiming you’re about to be assaulted by unwanted telemarketing calls to your wireless phone. Don’t worry, placing telemarketing calls to wireless phones is — and always has been — illegal in most cases.
According to the FCC, a number of emails circulating the Internet suggest that if your mobile number is listed in a wireless 411 directory, it will be available to telemarketers, and you will start to receive sales calls.
Here Are the Facts from the FCC:
- At present, a wireless 411 directory is only in the idea stage.
- Even if a wireless 411 directory is established, most telemarketing calls to wireless phones would still be illegal. For example, it is unlawful for any person to make any call (other than a call made for emergency purposes or made with express prior consent) using any automatic telephone dialing system or any artificial or prerecorded voice message to any telephone number assigned to a paging service, mobile telephone service or any service for which the called party is charged for the call. This prohibition applies regardless of whether the number is listed on the national Do-Not-Call list.
You can read more from the FCC here.
thanks for the information. this is quite a relief..:p
Report this comment
I got repeated calls from the “Telemarketer from Hell” on my cell phone. My Attorney told me if he kept it up I could sue him. He finally quit. It’s nice to know that this jerk could pe prosecuted also if what he was doing is illegal.
Report this comment
I have no doubt that what you say is true. But we ARE getting unwanted calls on cell phones. This is due not to the phone companies’ releasing our numbers but to robocallers that can dial number combinations at random until they get one that rings. Once your number is “out there” it’s all over. In the last 6 weeks we have been inundated with unwanted calls (about 90% of all calls to our landline and 2 unpublished cell numbers are unwanted). Even though the Do Not Call Registry requires only 2-3 minutes to file a complaint, this takes too much time when you’re reporting a dozen calls per day. Total waste of time. I’ve also tried blocking numbers, but my carrier allows only 20. The robocallers call from hundreds of different numbers, and if one is blocked the same company calls from another phone. The FCC needs to come up with a better reporting system, e.g. once a week fill out a general complaint form in which you can enter all the unwanted callers that have called you that week. AND then need to pursue the offenders more aggressively. Robocallers use recorded messages so you can’t even tell them to stop calling. And it’s easier just not to answer than to pick up and determine if it’s a recording (it was, every time I did pick up, so I now assume).
Report this comment