How This Scam Occurs

You receive a call at your office from someone claiming to be a telephone company employee investigating technical problems with your line, or checking up on calls supposedly placed to other states or countries from your line. The caller asks you to aid the investigation by either dialing 90# or transferring him/her to an outside line before hanging up the telephone receiver. By doing this, you may be enabling the caller to place calls that are billed to your office telephone number.

What You Should Know

·         Telephone company employees checking for technical and other types of telephone service or billing problems would not call and ask a subscriber to dial a specific series of numbers before hanging up the telephone receiver.

·         Telephone company employees would not request subscribers to connect the caller to an outside line before hanging up the receiver.

·         These types of calls are made to trick subscribers into taking actions that will enable the caller to place fraudulent calls.

·         This scam only works if your telephone is served by a private branch exchange (PBX) or private automatic branch exchange (PABX).

What to Do

If your place of business utilizes either a PBX or a PABX, you or your company telecommunications manager should contact the manufacturer of the PBX or PABX and the telephone companies that provide you with local and long distance service to obtain information about the type of security systems available to protect your telephone system from toll fraud. You may also ask about any monitoring services that help detect unusual telephone system usage.

Avoid Becoming a Target

To avoid becoming a target of this scam, educate yourself and other employees about the 90# scam. Encourage employees to take the following steps if they think that a telephone call is fraudulent or is part of this scam:

·         Ask the caller for his/her name and telephone number;

·         Tell the caller you are going to call the telephone company immediately to determine whether or not there is a problem with the line;

·         Immediately hang up the receiver; do not dial any numbers or transfer the caller to an outside line before hanging up;

·         Find the telephone number for your telephone service provider and/or its security office and report the suspicious phone call. Be prepared to provide details of the call to the telephone company representative; and

If you don’t change the default password on your voice mailbox, you, or your company, could be in for a big – and expensive – surprise. The Federal Communications Commission (FCC) has become aware of a form of fraud that allows hackers to use a consumer’s or business’s voice mail system and the default password to accept collect calls without the knowledge or permission of the consumer.

1. Hackers usually break into voice mail systems during holiday periods or weekends, when callers will not be calling; thus, the changing of the outgoing message goes unnoticed.

• Uses an independent third party to verify your oral authorization to switch.

• Provides and obtains your signature on a letter that indicates, in writing, that you want to switch preferred telephone companies.

• Provides a toll-free number that you can call to confirm the order to switch preferred telephone companies.

The National Do-Not-Call List

Once you have placed your home phone number or numbers, including any personal wireless phone numbers, on the national Do-Not-Call list, callers are prohibited from making telephone solicitations to those number(s). Your number or numbers will remain on the list until you remove them or discontinue service – there is no need to re-register numbers.

The national Do-Not-Call list protects home voice or personal wireless phone numbers only. While you may be able to register a business number, your registration will not make telephone solicitations to that number unlawful. Similarly, registering either a home or business fax number will not make sending a fax advertisement to that number unlawful, but the FCC has separate rules that prohibit unsolicited fax advertisements under most circumstances. For more information on the rules for fax advertisements, see our consumer fact sheet at www.fcc.gov/cgb/consumerfacts/unwantedfaxes.html, or visit our Web site at www.fcc.gov/cgb/policy/faxadvertising.html.

A telephone solicitation is a telephone call that acts as an advertisement. The term does not include calls or messages placed with your express prior permission, by or on behalf of a tax-exempt non-profit organization, or from a person or organization with which you have an established business relationship (EBR).

An EBR exists if you have made an inquiry, application, purchase, or transaction regarding products or services offered by the person or entity involved. Generally, you may put an end to that relationship by telling the person or entity not to place any more solicitation calls to your home. Additionally, the EBR is only in effect for 18 months after your last business transaction or three months after your last inquiry or application. After these time periods, calls placed to your home phone number or numbers by that person or entity are considered telephone solicitations subject to the do-not-call rules.

While registering home phone numbers on the national Do-Not-Call list prohibits telephone solicitations, this action does not make prank or harassing calls unlawful. For problems with such calls, contact local law enforcement agencies.

You can register your home phone number or numbers on the national Do-Not-Call list by phone or by Internet at no cost. To add a phone number to the national Do-Not-Call list via the Internet, go to www.donotcall.gov. To register by phone, call 1-888-382-1222 (voice) or 1-866-290-4236 (TTY). You must call from the phone number you wish to register. For more information on the national Do-Not-Call list, visit our Web site at www.fcc.gov/cgb/donotcall.

Company-Specific Do-Not-Call Lists

Whether or not your home phone number or numbers are registered on the national Do-Not-Call list, the FCC requires a person or entity placing voice telephone solicitations to your home to maintain a record of your direct request to that caller not to receive future telephone solicitations from that person or entity. The calling company must honor your do-not-call request for five years. To prevent calls after five years, you will need to repeat your request to the company, and it must honor it for another five years (and so on). Your request should also stop calls from affiliated entities if you would reasonably expect them to be included, given the identification of the caller and the product being advertised. Unless your home phone number or numbers are registered on the national Do-Not-Call list, however, you must make a separate do-not-call request to each telemarketer from whom you do not wish to receive calls.

When you receive telephone solicitation calls, clearly state that you want to be added to the caller’s do-not-call list. You may want to keep a list of those persons or businesses that you have asked not to call you. Tax-exempt non-profit organizations are not required to keep do-not-call lists.

State Do-Not-Call Lists

Additionally, many states now have statewide do-not-call lists for residents in their respective states. Contact your state’s public service commission or consumer protection office to see if your state has such a list, and to find out how to register your number or numbers. For contact information for your state public service commission, go to www.naruc.org/commissions.cfm. You can also find contact information for these offices in the blue pages or government section of your local telephone directory.

Automatic Telephone Dialing Systems and Artificial or Prerecorded Voice Calls

The FCC has specific rules for automatic telephone dialing systems, also known as “autodialers.” These devices can be particularly annoying and generate many consumer complaints. The rules regarding automatically dialed and prerecorded calls apply whether or not you have registered your home phone number(s) on the national Do-Not-Call list.

Autodialers can produce, store, and dial telephone numbers using a random or sequential number generator. They often place artificial (computerized) or prerecorded voice calls. The use of autodialers, including predictive dialers, often results in abandoned calls – hang-ups or “dead air.” Except for emergency calls or calls made with the prior express consent of the person being called, autodialers and any artificial or prerecorded voice messages may not be used to contact numbers assigned to:

• any emergency telephone line;

• the telephone line of any guest or patient room at a hospital, health care facility, home for the elderly, or similar establishment;

• a paging service, wireless phone service (including both voice calls and text messages), or other commercial mobile radio service; or

• any other service for which the person being called would be charged for the call.

Calls using artificial or prerecorded voice messages – including those that do not use autodialers – may not be made to home phone numbers except for:

• emergency calls needed to ensure the consumer’s health and safety;

• calls for which you have given prior express consent;

• non-commercial calls;

• calls that don’t include or introduce any unsolicited advertisements or constitute telephone solicitations;

• calls by, or on behalf of, tax-exempt non-profit organizations; or

• calls from entities with which you have an EBR.

In addition, the FCC’s rules prohibit the use of autodialers in a way that ties up two or more lines of a multi-line business at the same time. All artificial or prerecorded telephone messages must state, at the beginning, the identity of the business, individual, or other entity that is responsible for initiating the call. If a business is responsible for initiating the call, the name under which the entity is registered to conduct business with the State Corporation Commission (or comparable regulatory authority) must be stated. During or after the message, the caller must give the telephone number (other than that of the autodialer or prerecorded message player that placed the call) of the business, other entity, or individual that made the call so that you can call during regular business hours to ask that the company no longer call you. The number provided may not be a 900 number or any other number for which charges exceed local or long distance charges.

Autodialers that deliver a recorded message must release the called party’s telephone line within five seconds of the time that the calling system receives notification that the called party’s line has hung up. In some areas, you could experience a delay before you can get a dial tone again. Your local telephone company can tell you if there is a delay in your area.

Telemarketers must ensure that predictive dialers abandon no more than three percent of all calls placed and answered by a person. A call will be considered "abandoned" if it is not transferred to a live sales agent within two seconds of the recipient's greeting.

Caller Identification (ID)

If you have caller ID, a telemarketer is required to transmit or display its phone number and, if available, its name or the name and phone number of the company for which it is selling products. The display must include a phone number that you can call during regular business hours to ask that the company no longer call you. This rule applies even if you have an EBR with the company, and even if you have not registered your home phone number(s) on the national Do-Not-Call list. Before these rules took effect, the words “private,” “out of area,” or “unavailable” might have appeared on the Caller ID display. 

Amended Fax Rules and Established Business Relationship Exemption

The rules provide that it is unlawful to send unsolicited advertisements to any fax machine, including those at both businesses and residences, without the recipient’s prior express invitation or permission. Fax advertisements, however, may be sent to recipients with whom the sender has an EBR, as long as the fax number was provided voluntarily by the recipient. Specifically, a fax advertisement may be sent to an EBR customer if the sender also:

• obtains the fax number directly from the recipient, through, for example, an application, contact information form, or membership renewal form; or

• obtains the fax number from the recipient’s own directory, advertisement, or site on the Internet, unless the recipient has noted on such materials that it does not accept unsolicited advertisements at the fax number in question; or

• has taken reasonable steps to verify that the recipient consented to have the number listed, if obtained from a directory or other source of information compiled by a third party.

If the sender had an EBR with the recipient and possessed the recipient’s fax number before July 9, 2005 (the date the Junk Fax Prevention Act became law), the sender may send the fax advertisements without demonstrating how the number was obtained.

Opt-out Notice Requirements

Senders of permissible fax advertisements (those sent under an EBR or with the recipient’s prior express permission) must provide notice and contact information on the fax that allows recipients to “opt-out” of future faxes. The notice must:

• be clear and conspicuous and on the first page of the advertisement;

• state that the recipient may make a request to the sender not to send any future faxes and that failure to comply with the request within 30 days is unlawful; and

• include a telephone number, fax number, and cost-free mechanism (including a toll-free telephone number, local number for local recipients, toll-free fax number, Web site address, or e-mail address) to opt-out of faxes. These numbers and cost-free mechanism must permit consumers to make opt-out requests 24 hours a day, seven days a week.

Senders who receive a request not to send further faxes that meets the requirements listed in the next section must honor that request within the shortest reasonable time from the date of the request, not to exceed 30 days. They are also prohibited from sending future fax advertisements to the recipient unless the recipient subsequently provides prior express permission to the sender.

Opt-out Requests By Consumers

To stop unwanted fax advertisements, your “opt-out” request must:

• identify the fax number or numbers to which it relates; and

• be sent to the telephone number, fax number, Web site address, or e-mail address identified on the fax advertisement.

If you change your mind about receiving fax advertisements, you can subsequently grant express permission to receive faxes from a particular sender, orally or in writing.

Fax Broadcasters

Often fax advertisements are sent in bulk on behalf of a business or entity by separate professional fax broadcasters. Generally, the person or business on whose behalf a fax is sent or whose property, goods, or services are advertised is liable for a violation of the junk fax rules, even if the person or business did not physically send the fax. A fax broadcaster also may be liable if it has a “high degree of involvement” in the sender’s fax message, such as supplying the fax numbers to which the message is sent, providing a source of fax numbers, making representations about the legality of faxing to those numbers, or advising about how to comply with the junk fax rules. Also, if a fax broadcaster is “highly involved” in the sender’s fax messages, the fax broadcaster must provide its name on the fax.

Fax Numbers and the National Do-Not-Call List

Registering a home phone number on the national Do-Not-Call list prevents only telephone solicitations directed to that number, not fax advertisements to your home or business fax number. For more information on our telephone solicitation rules, see our consumer fact sheet at www.fcc.gov/cgb/consumerfacts/tcpa.html or visit our Web site at www.fcc.gov/cgb/donotcall. The FCC’s junk fax rules nevertheless prohibit fax advertisements unless you have an EBR with the sender or have given your prior express permission to receive the fax advertisements.