FCC slaps $300M fine on “largest illegal robocall operation” it’s ever seen

@fne8w2ah "Two of the central players of the operation, Roy M. Cox and Aaron Michael Jones, were under lifetime bans against making telemarketing calls following lawsuits by the Federal Trade Commission and State of Texas."
WHY AREN’T THEY IN JAIL
- How much money were they making off telemarketing that they were fucking banned for life from doing it and they still did it?
  Also:
  At the time, the FTC said that Cox was issued "a $1.1 million civil penalty that will be suspended due to his inability to pay.
  Oh ok, so this fine for more money will certainly mean something...
  
  I feel like we have places to put people who ruin society. Was it mail, rail, shale? I dunno, set them free and bring me a coffee, bailiff.
  
  Political theatre to make it seem like they're doing something about the issue. When in reality, nothing changes.
- Anyone got a number?
  I have some very important information for them regarding expiration of their vehicle warranties.
  
  That would be a good penalty for them. Their phone number(s) must always be public so anyone can call them whenever they want.
- WHY ARE THEY STILL BREATHING?

I don't understand why these people weren't in jail already!
- Yeah, I don't get why this seemed to be such a huge undertaking. The phone companies certainly know who's making all these calls on their networks.
  
  The phone companies certainly know who’s making all these calls on their networks.
  Exactly. If the networks faced consequences for knowingly routing and profiting off these illegal phone calls they would stop fairly quickly.
  
  Cause they were complicit.
- i assume someone was making money off this, and has made enough money to get rid of them so other people don't make money...

It’s kind of amazing how we’d been answering phones when they rang for a century, until a handful of greedy wankers like these guys and the offshore “calling from Windows” folks started doing their thing a few years ago. Now only the elderly and folks required to answer for work even contemplate picking a call up.
- I don't answer my work phone anymore. Our company uses teams. So if it's not a teams call, you can't make me answer the phone.
  
  I haven't had a legitimate phone call on my work line in the last 8 years. Anyone who truly needs to talk to me has my cell number and several other ways to contact me.
- I got so many spam calls I considered changing the number I've had for over 2 decades. So obnoxious.
  
  I wouldn’t recommend that. I did it once for the same reason and got just as many spam calls plus debt collectors trying to reach the person who had the number before me.
  
  It's not your number. It's all the numbers.

- What's worse is whenever I Google the numbers I see them on lists on obscure incoherent randomly generated .ru sites which make me think they are some kind of phishing operation, but my carrier will gladly display as verified/check marked businesses complete with old/spoofed caller IDs 3-4x a day.
  Completely unusable trash system, yet it's critical national infrastructure.
- I have a number from outside the area codes of where I live. Block every call from the area code of my number. Like, too bad if you legitimately call me from there but the spam is too damn high.
  Any recommendations for software that will auto-block numbers that do not leave a message?

Good to see the FCC going after this kind of thing. Put them in jail even better.
I have my phone set up so the only numbers that chime the phone are those in my contact list. The abuse of voice and text on the cell network is rampant and it's equivalent to trespassing.

Shred all robo caller companies and give the owners jail time.

This is the best summary I could come up with:
"An international network of companies violated federal statutes and the Commission's regulations when they executed a scheme to make more than five billion robocalls to more than 500 million phone numbers during a three-month span in 2021, including violating federal spoofing laws by using more than one million different caller ID numbers in an attempt to disguise the true origin of the robocalls and trick victims into answering the phone," the FCC said.
"Since at least 2018, this enterprise operated a complex scheme designed to facilitate the sale of vehicle service contracts under the false and misleading claim of selling auto warranties," the FCC said.
"Two of the central players of the operation, Roy M. Cox and Aaron Michael Jones, were under lifetime bans against making telemarketing calls following lawsuits by the Federal Trade Commission and State of Texas."
The FCC said it took action to block the robocalling scheme last year by directing "all US-based voice service providers to cease carrying traffic associated with certain members of the enterprise.
The FCC coordinated last year's action with the Ohio attorney general's office, which filed a lawsuit against Jones, Cox, and others involved in the alleged robocalling scheme.
Cox was banned from telemarketing in a 2013 settlement with the FTC, which accused him of sending "illegal robocalls offering credit card interest rate reduction programs, extended automobile warranties, and home security systems."
I'm a bot and I'm open source!
- Can someone make a TL;DR bot the TL;DR bot?
  
  BEEP BOOP. Omega-TLDR bot activated.
  Two trash humans were asked nicely to not do it again, and did it again. don’t worry though the prison cells they should have been locked away in are filled with minor drug charges by minorities or something else equally stupid.
  
  TLDR: the perpetrators were trying to reach you about your car’s extended warranty.

Fines aren’t near enough at this point, we need public executions at a minimum to put a dent in this problem.
- No killing them is too extreme. Put them in a room with 1,000 different types of ringing telephones for a week.
- The way I see it, an alleged murderer is entitled to a trial by an impartial jury of one's peers. However, It would be improper for victims of the deceased to serve on the jury trying the murder case.
  When the deceased has continuously harassed everyone with a phone for the past 20+ years, it is impossible to assemble an impartial jury. Impossible to assemble a jury means it is also impossible to convict.
- I like the shame bell from game of thrones.
  
  Yes, I suppose we could beat telemarketers to death with that bell just as well as with anything else.

Not gonna help. Not accepting calls from unknown numbers and/or automated filtering is the only way forward, the model of being able to just call anyone is broken.

So, what tiny fraction of their profits does this fine represent?
- Ya I appreciate the gesture but if this truly is the "biggest" robocall racket I have to imagine a 300M fine is a dropping the bucket
  
  Not Like they will pay it anyway.
- Probably like 1%, maybe 2%
- That information does not appear in the article.

Ban all robocalls, legal or illegal. If any business that needs to reach can leave a voicemail. I'll decide then which should be deleted and which required a call back.

How many of you have received these calls? I got a ton of them along with my husband and siblings.
- Those were partly the reason I stopped answering unknown numbers.
  
  Spam callers have basically ruined telephone as a medium. For many, a phone call is more likely to be fake and spam than it is to be legitimate. And even if the call claims to come from a source you might trust, good odds it's spoofed and thus cannot in fact be trusted.
  A shame on telecoms for not being willing to tackle the problem.
  
  Same, the only time I answer my phone is when I want to mess with the spammers.
- I've started forwarding the calls to Google voice or if i accidentally pick the call, i use bixby's auto answer.
  Either eay the call drops in a hot second.

$300M feels like "Ahh we caught you now, bad boys, don't let me catch you again. Now go have your lunch."
These people should be punished harsher for all the lives they've destroyed intentionally.

Good! Large fines create a meaningful deterrent for bad behavior.
- Sure deterred them from doing it again after the first time… oh wait.
  
  We've had one fine yes, but what about second fine?
- Cox was banned from telemarketing in a 2013 settlement with the FTC, which accused him of sending "illegal robocalls offering credit card interest rate reduction programs, extended automobile warranties, and home security systems." At the time, the FTC said that Cox was issued "a $1.1 million civil penalty that will be suspended due to his inability to pay."
  In 2017, the FTC obtained a similar telemarketing ban on Jones. He was also fined $2.7 million, but, as with Cox, the fine was "suspended based on his inability to pay."
  No fine is going to be paid this time either I imagine.
  
  I'm not normally a proponent of prison for debtors, but in the case of these motherfuckers I'd be happy if they threw away the key.
  
  suspended based on his inability to pay
  If only he had some way to make money fast.
- Maybe it'll help as long as the fine is some % of their net income. Sweden does this, speeding tickets are a % of your income instead of a fixed fine, so someone with $10MM will still feel the burn.
- Depends on if they make so much money that 300M is just cost of doing business. There needs to be prison time for those involved.
  Also $300M is the public fine number. Usually the actual fine is less than what is made public.

Curious what kind qualifies as a legal robocall.
- A reminder about your dentist appointment.
  
  Just expanding on this, you can robocall anyone with whom you have personal or business dealings but must cease immediately when requested.
- Politicians probably allow themselves to call everyone.

Is it Duns and Bradstreet?

can we do something about homelessness, drug addiction/rehabilitation, and income support for families first? Would love 300mil for that
Idgaf about the robocallers compared to our real social issues. This is miniscule
- Are you against fines or against how they’re being allocated?
  
  whoops misread the "fine" part
- Scam callers and all those issues you listed are probably a statistic. These assholes scam seniors out of millions (probably billions worldwide) if someone loses their money, and can't afford their mortgage or rent, they are much likely to end up on the street.