The Federal Trade Commission is looking for whomever is using unsolicited e-mail, better known as spam, to trick recipients into calling an international adult entertainment telephone line.
The agency has filed a lawsuit in U.S. District Court, Charlotte, NC, against “One or more unknown parties deceiving consumers into calling an international audiotext service accessed through telephone number (767) 445-1775,” in Dominica, West Indies.
Under international agreements, U.S. telephone carriers ordinarily bill consumers for their pay-per-call charges and forward the funds to the Dominica telephone company, which in turn, distributes portions of the revenues to the audiotext service.
The FTC, which seeks a court order blocking those payments and freezing the assets of the defendants, claims that the defendants use bulk e-mail to persuade recipients to call a telephone number about an alleged order for merchandise. The calls result in consumers paying telephone charges of between $250 and $899 per call, the FTC charges.
The action follows the creation by the FTC of the Internet Advertising Group, a Internet-monitoring watchdog group.
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