Avid Telecom has made billions of illegal robocalls to people on the national Do Not Call Registry, according to multiple attorneys general.
The Anti-Robocall Multistate Litigation Task Force is a bipartisan cooperative of 51 attorneys general. One from each U.S. state and an additional one from the District of Columbia. It was formed in 2022 to investigate and litigate telecommunications companies violating the laws about robocall traffic, after several individuals were convicted of telecom fraud in 2021 for election interference, especially calling black voters and posing as government officials to tell them that going to the polls was dangerous and voting by mail was illegal.
“Every day, countless Arizona consumers are harassed and annoyed by a relentless barrage of unwanted robocalls — and in some instances these illegal calls threaten consumers with lawsuits and arrest,” said Arizona Attorney General Kris Mayes in a statement. “More disturbingly, many of these calls are scams designed to pressure frightened consumers, often senior citizens, into handing over their hard-earned money.”
The lawsuit said Avid Telecom used spoofed or invalid caller ID numbers, including more than 8.4 million calls that appeared to be coming from government and law enforcement agencies as well as private companies.
The 141-page lawsuit was filed on Tuesday in a U.S. District Court in Phoenix, where Avid Telecom is headquartered. It named the company, its owner Michael D. Lansky, and company vice president Stacey S. Reeves as defendants.
The laws involved are the Telephone Consumer Protection Act, the Telemarketing Sales Rule, and several more laws regarding telemarketing and retail, both state and federal.
“Contrary to the allegations in the complaint, Avid Telecom operates in a manner that is compliant with all applicable state and federal laws and regulations,” said Neil Ende, the company’s outside legal counsel. “The company has never been found by any court or regulatory authority to have transmitted unlawful traffic and it is prepared to meet with the attorneys general, as it has on many occasions in the past, to further demonstrate its good faith and lawful conduct.
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