Regulatory Commission of Alaska

FTC Releases Updated Do Not Call Registry Data Book; Impersonator Fraud Tops List of Consumer Complaints

A link to the full article can be found here .

The Federal Trade Commission (FTC) today released the National Do Not Call Registry Data Book for Fiscal Year 2022 . The FTC’s National Do Not Call (DNC) Registry lets consumers add their phone number and choose not to receive most legal telemarketing calls

In it’s fourteenth year of publication, the Data Book also provides the most recent fiscal year information available on robocall complaints, the types of calls consumers reported to the FTC, and a complete state-by-state analysis.

Complaints about imposter calls again topped the list, with almost 287,000 received during the fiscal year ending on September 30, 2022, including both live calls and robocalls. In such calls, imposters falsely pose as government representatives, such as the Social Security Administration or the IRS, legitimate business entities, or as people affiliated with them.

In FY 2022, the FTC received 1.8 million complaints about robocalls. For every month in the fiscal year, robocalls—defined under FTC regulations as calls delivering a prerecorded message—made up most consumer complaints about DNC violations, with 200,000 coming in January of this year.

Imposters were once again the topic of the robocalls consumers reported the most, with more than 209,000 complaints received. Warranties and protection plans comprised the second-most reported topic, with consumers filing more than 179,000 robocall complaints. Calls about medical and prescription issues made up the third-most reported topic, followed by complaints about supposed debt-reduction, and energy, solar, and utilities.

Voice over Internet Protocol (VoIP) technology allows callers, including lawbreakers, to make higher volumes of calls inexpensively from anywhere in the world. The FTC brought its first two cases against interconnected VoIP service providers for assisting and facilitating abusive telemarketing calls in 2019-20. Enforcement continued in this area in 2022, including the case against VoIP service provider VOIP Terminator .

Information for consumers about the  DNC Registry ,  company-specific DNC requests, and telemarketer caller ID requirements  can be found on the FTC’s website, and  consumers can sign up for the DNC Registry for free .  Other information about robocalls and what consumers can do about them  is also available. To report unwanted telemarketing calls, consumers can file a complaint at  www.donotcall.gov  or call 1-888-382-1222. The FTC works to promote competition and protect and educate consumers . Learn more about consumer topics at consumer.ftc.gov , or report fraud, scams, and bad business practices at  ReportFraud.ftc.gov . Follow the FTC on social media , read consumer alerts  and the business blog , and sign up to get the latest FTC news and alerts .