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Report to Congressional Committees: 

April 2006: 

Telecommunications: 

Weaknesses in Procedures and Performance Management Hinder Junk Fax 
Enforcement: 

[Hyperlink, http://www.gao.gov/cgi-bin/getrpt?GAO-06-425]: 

GAO Highlights: 

Highlights of GAO-06-425, a report to congressional committees: 

Why GAO Did This Study: 

The Telephone Consumer Protection Act of 1991 prohibited invasive 
telemarketing practices, including the faxing of unsolicited 
advertisements, known as “junk faxes,” to individual consumers and 
businesses. Junk faxes create costs for consumers (paper and toner) and 
disrupt their fax operations. The Junk Fax Prevention Act of 2005 
clarified an established business relationship exemption, specified opt-
out procedures for consumers, and requires the Federal Communications 
Commission (FCC)—the federal agency responsible for junk fax 
enforcement—to report annually to Congress on junk fax complaints and 
enforcement. The law also required GAO to report to Congress on FCC’s 
enforcement of the junk fax laws. This report addresses (1) FCC’s junk 
fax procedures and outcomes, (2) the strengths and weaknesses of FCC’s 
procedures, and (3) FCC’s junk fax management challenges. 

What GAO Found: 

FCC has procedures for receiving and acknowledging the rapidly 
increasing number of junk fax complaints, but the numbers of 
investigations and enforcement actions have generally remained the 
same. In 2000, FCC recorded about 2,200 junk fax complaints; in 2005, 
it recorded over 46,000. Using its procedures to review the complaints, 
FCC’s Enforcement Bureau (EB) issued 261 citations (i.e., warnings) 
from 2000 through 2005. EB has ordered six companies to pay forfeitures 
for continuing to violate the junk fax rules after receiving a 
citation. The six forfeitures totaled over $6.9 million, none of which 
has been collected by the Department of Justice for various reasons. EB 
officials cited competing demands, resource constraints, and the rising 
sophistication of junk faxers in hiding their identities as hindrances 
to enforcement. 

An emphasis on customer service, an effort to document consumers’ 
complaints, and an attempt to target enforcement resources efficiently 
are the strengths of FCC’s procedures; however, inefficient data 
management, resulting in time-consuming manual data entry, data errors, 
and—most important—the exclusion of the majority of complaints from 
decisions about investigations and enforcement, are weaknesses. FCC’s 
guidance to consumers does not provide them with all of the information 
they need to support FCC’s enforcement efforts. 

FCC faces management challenges in carrying out its junk fax 
responsibilities. The commission has no clearly articulated long-term 
or annual goals for junk fax monitoring and enforcement, and it is not 
analyzing the junk fax data. Without analysis, FCC cannot explore the 
need for, or implement, changes to its rules, procedures, or consumer 
guidance that might help deter junk fax violations or give consumers a 
better understanding of the junk fax rules. Most important, without 
performance goals and measures and without analysis of complaint and 
enforcement data, it is not possible to explore the effectiveness of 
current enforcement measures. 

Citations Issued to Junk Fax Violators, Complaints Resulting in a 
Citation, and Approximate Percentage of Total Annual Complaints 
Resulting in a Citation, 2000-2005: 

[See Table 1] 

What GAO Recommends: 

GAO recommends that FCC revise its junk fax guidance for consumers, 
develop data management strategies, and implement recognized 
performance management practices in carrying out its junk fax 
responsibilities. FCC officials said they generally concur with the 
recommendations. FCC also provided technical comments that were 
incorporated throughout this report as appropriate. 

www.gao.gov/cgi-bin/getrpt?GAO-06-425. 

To view the full product, including the scope and methodology, click on 
the link above. For more information, contact Mark L. Goldstein, (202) 
512-2834, goldsteinm@gao.gov. 

[End of section] 

Contents: 

Letter: 

Results in Brief: 

Background: 

FCC Has Recorded a Growing Number of Junk Fax Complaints, but Has Taken 
Limited Enforcement Action to Date: 

FCC's Procedures Have Emphasized Customer Service and Documentation, 
but Enforcement Is Hampered by Multiple Factors: 

FCC Faces Management Challenges in Carrying Out Its Junk Fax 
Responsibilities: 

Conclusions: 

Recommendations for Executive Action: 

Agency Comments and Our Evaluation: 

Appendixes: 

Appendix I: Statutes Protecting Consumers from Unsolicited 
Advertisements: 

Regulating Unsolicited Telephone and E-mail Advertisements: 

Appendix II: Scope and Methodology: 

Appendix III: Consumer Complaints Reported to FCC: 

Tables: 

Table 1: Citations Issued to Junk Fax Violators, Complaints Resulting 
in a Citation, and Approximate Percentage of Total Annual Complaints 
Resulting in a Citation, 2000-2005: 

Table 2: Status of Forfeitures Issued for Repeat Junk Fax Violations, 
2000-2005: 

Table 3: Number of Complaints Reported Publicly by FCC, by Type, 2003-
2005: 

Figures: 

Figure 1: FCC's Process for Responding to Junk Fax Complaints: 

Figure 2: Number of Individual Consumer and Business Junk Fax 
Complaints, by Method Submitted to FCC, 2003-2005: 

Figure 3: FCC Form 475: Internet Complaint Form for General- 
Communications Related Issues: 

Figure 4: Number of Junk Fax Complaints with an Attachment That Could 
Be a Fax, 2003-2005: 

Figure 5: Percentage of TCPA Complaints Reported in FCC Quarterly 
Reports That Are Junk Fax Complaints, 2003-2005: 

Abbreviations: 

CAN-SPAM Act: Controlling Assault of Non-Solicited Pornography & 
Marketing Act of 2003: 

CGB: Consumer & Governmental Affairs Bureau: 

DOJ: Department of Justice: 

EB: Enforcement Bureau: 

EBR: established business relationship: 

FCC: Federal Communications Commission: 

FTC: Federal Trade Commission: 

GPRA: Government Performance and Results Act of 1993: 

ISP: Internet service provider: 

OGC: Office of General Counsel: 

SEC: Securities and Exchange Commission: 

TCPA: Telephone Consumer Protection Act of 1991: 

TSR: Telemarketing Sales Rule: 

Letter April 5, 2006: 

The Honorable Ted Stevens: 
Chairman: 
The Honorable Daniel Inouye: 
Co-Chairman: 
Committee on Commerce, Science, and Transportation: 
United States Senate: 

The Honorable Joe Barton: 
Chairman: 
The Honorable John Dingell: 
Ranking Minority Member: 
Committee on Energy and Commerce: 
House of Representatives: 

For more than a decade, it has generally been illegal to send 
unsolicited facsimile (fax) advertisements, commonly known as "junk 
faxes," to consumers and businesses. This type of advertising burdens 
consumers and businesses because they incur costs associated with 
receiving the fax (paper and toner) as well as cause disruptions to 
their fax operations. The Telephone Consumer Protection Act of 1991 
(TCPA)[Footnote 1] prohibited a variety of telemarketing practices, 
including the faxing of advertisements without the recipient's prior 
express permission. In 1992, the Federal Communications Commission 
(FCC) established rules for receiving junk fax complaints and taking 
enforcement actions. In July 2005, Congress enacted the Junk Fax 
Prevention Act of 2005 (2005 Act),[Footnote 2] which amended certain 
provisions of TCPA. Specifically, the 2005 Act clarified an 
"established business relationship" exception, required specific opt- 
out procedures for consumers and businesses, and required FCC to report 
annually to Congress on junk fax complaints and enforcement actions. 
FCC is to adopt new rules implementing these changes by April 5, 2006. 

The 2005 Act required GAO to report to Congress on FCC's enforcement of 
the junk fax laws. Accordingly, we answered the following questions in 
this report: (1) What procedures has FCC established for taking action 
on junk fax complaints--including procedures for receipt, 
acknowledgment, investigation, and enforcement--and to what extent has 
it taken such action? (2) What are the strengths and weaknesses of 
FCC's junk fax procedures? and (3) What challenges do FCC face in 
carrying out its junk fax responsibilities? In addition, we provide in 
appendix I of this report information on enforcement measures and 
penalties that have been established to protect consumers from other 
types of unsolicited advertising. 

To assess FCC's procedures, implementation, and strengths and 
weaknesses, we reviewed the applicable statutes and FCC rules 
pertaining to junk fax enforcement. We interviewed FCC officials 
responsible for receiving junk fax complaints and taking enforcement 
actions. We obtained FCC data on junk fax complaints and enforcement 
actions and reviewed portions of the complaint database and enforcement 
spreadsheet. Although we discuss limitations to the complaint data in 
the report, we determined that these data were sufficiently reliable 
for us to present overall trends and approximate figures.[Footnote 3] 
To identify challenges, we compared FCC's enforcement efforts with 
recognized performance management practices and reviewed applicable FCC 
performance goals, measures, and data analysis. Finally, we reviewed 
other statutes relevant to protecting consumers from unsolicited 
advertisements. We conducted our work from November 2005 through March 
2006 in accordance with generally accepted government auditing 
standards. See appendix II for a more detailed explanation of our scope 
and methodology. 

Results in Brief: 

FCC has applied its procedures for receiving and acknowledging junk fax 
complaints to the rapidly increasing number of complaints; however, the 
numbers of investigations and enforcement actions have generally 
remained about the same. In 2000, FCC recorded about 2,200 junk fax 
complaints; in 2005, it recorded over 46,000. FCC has never separately 
publicly reported the annual number of junk fax complaints. Yet, since 
2003, consumers have complained more to FCC about junk faxes than about 
any other issue under FCC's jurisdiction except indecency and obscenity 
in radio and television broadcasting. Both individual consumers and 
businesses can report junk fax complaints to FCC by e-mail, postal 
mail, fax, or telephone or through an on-line complaint form. FCC's 
Consumer & Governmental Affairs Bureau (CGB) receives and records these 
complaints in a database, scans in any attachments, and acknowledges 
most complaints in a letter sent by postal mail that provides 
information on the complainant's enforcement rights. FCC's Enforcement 
Bureau (EB) handles junk fax investigations and enforcement. Because of 
the large number of complaints and limited resources, EB does not 
investigate each junk fax complaint received by FCC. Instead, EB 
officials said, they try to identify and take enforcement action 
against the major alleged violators and repeat offenders who, they 
believe, have had the greatest impact on consumers. EB's formal 
enforcement actions, as required by statute, consist of two sequential 
steps. First, EB may issue a citation that notifies the faxer of the 
complaint(s) against it and informs the faxer that its alleged activity 
is illegal. Second, if FCC receives further complaints against a faxer, 
EB may pursue a "forfeiture" action (i.e., a monetary penalty against 
the faxer). FCC has issued 261 citations covering 1,456 junk fax 
complaints, or just over 1 percent of the more than 108,000 junk fax 
complaints recorded by FCC from 2000 to 2005. EB officials said that 
they have identified eight repeat offenders from the 261 citations 
issued and have pursued forfeiture actions against each of them. Six of 
these eight repeat offenders have received forfeiture orders. The 
amounts of the monetary forfeitures have increased, and the six 
forfeiture orders total over $6.9 million, but the Department of 
Justice has collected no forfeitures to date because, for example, 
violators were no longer in business or could not be located. EB 
officials identified competing demands, resource constraints, and the 
rising sophistication of junk faxers in hiding their identities as 
hindrances to enforcement. 

An emphasis on customer service, an effort to document consumer 
complaints, and an attempt to target enforcement resources efficiently 
are the strengths of FCC's procedures. However, inefficient and 
uncoordinated data management, resulting in time-consuming manual data 
entry, data errors, and--most important--the exclusion of the majority 
of complaints from decisions about investigations and enforcement, are 
weaknesses. CGB has emphasized customer service by establishing 
multiple methods for consumers to report junk fax complaints to FCC, 
providing multiple sources of information about junk fax issues, and 
sending a letter in response to most complainants. However, these 
procedures are time-consuming and errors can occur when complaints are 
miscoded or not matched with supporting faxes. These errors may, to an 
unknown extent, affect the reliability of CGB's complaint counts. They 
may also impact the quality of the report that FCC is now required to 
provide to Congress on the number of junk fax complaints received each 
year. In addition, CGB and EB have not coordinated their data needs. 
This has led to the development of a separate spreadsheet by EB because 
the CGB database does not meet its needs. As a result, EB analysts 
spend about half of their time on manual, redundant data entry. 
Furthermore, it is EB's practice to consider only complaints with an 
attached fax for enforcement action. For 2005, about 60 percent of the 
complaints--including almost all of the complaints reported via the 
Internet--did not have an attachment. Therefore, under EB's practice, 
the Internet complaints would not have been included in EB's 
enforcement spreadsheet. As a result, EB would not have included these 
complaints in its searches for major alleged violators or repeat 
offenders or have considered them in its decisions about investigation 
or enforcement. Compounding this problem is FCC's consumer guidance on 
submitting junk fax complaints. Some of this guidance encourages 
consumers to send in the junk faxes they have received. However, none 
of the guidance states that without a copy of the junk fax, EB analysts 
do not review a complaint, include it in their investigations, consider 
it for enforcement action, or include it in their searches for repeat 
offenders. Moreover, although about half of the junk fax complaints are 
now reported through FCC's Internet form, that form explains nothing 
about sending in the fax to FCC or how to do so. 

FCC faces management challenges in carrying out its junk fax 
responsibilities. The Government Performance and Results Act of 1993 
embodies recognized performance management practices that are to be 
applied to an agency's efforts in carrying out its various 
responsibilities. FCC does not appear to be applying these practices to 
its junk fax monitoring and enforcement efforts; therefore, it lacks an 
important tool in assessing and reporting its progress. For example, 
FCC has no clearly articulated long-term or annual goals for junk fax 
monitoring and enforcement. FCC is not using the information it 
collects through junk fax complaints to measure its performance, set 
priorities, or allocate resources. Additionally, FCC is not analyzing 
the nature and frequency of the principal types of junk fax problems 
that complainants are reporting. As a result, FCC has not fully 
addressed concerns that consumers are raising, such as the percentages 
of complainants who reported that they were continuing to receive junk 
faxes after calling the opt-out number or the impact of the National Do-
Not-Call Registry on junk faxes. Furthermore, FCC cannot identify and 
monitor trends in complaints and enforcement; therefore, it cannot 
target its resources to complainants' greatest concerns or evaluate its 
own performance in addressing those concerns. Having information on the 
nature and frequency of problems with opt-out numbers and FCC's success 
in addressing these problems is particularly important because 
Congress, in the 2005 Act, specified opt-out procedures to protect 
consumers and businesses from repeated unwanted faxes. Without 
analysis, FCC is limited in its ability to understand the need for 
changes to its rules, procedures, or consumer guidance that might help 
deter junk fax violations or give consumers a better understanding of 
the junk fax rules. For example, many comments in CGB's database 
indicated that consumers believed the National Do-Not-Call Registry 
that applies to telemarketers should protect them from junk faxes; 
however, FCC has only recently revised some of its guidance to clarify 
whether the National Do-Not-Call Registry applies to fax advertising. 
Most important, without establishing performance goals and measures and 
without analyzing complaint and enforcement data, it is not possible to 
explore the effectiveness of current enforcement measures. Without 
first gaining an understanding of the effectiveness of current 
enforcement measures, it is similarly not possible to determine whether 
additional enforcement measures are necessary to protect consumers. 

To address the procedural and performance management weaknesses we have 
identified, we recommend that the Chairman of FCC (1) revise FCC's 
current guidance to alert complainants of the necessity, under current 
FCC practices, of submitting a copy of the junk fax(es) along with the 
complaint; (2) develop data management strategies to make the consumer 
complaint database more usable to enforcement staff and mitigate the 
amount of time spent on manual data entry, as well as possible errors 
resulting from this manual data entry; and (3) implement recognized 
performance management practices to improve the performance and 
accountability of FCC's junk fax enforcement efforts. 

We provided a draft of this report to FCC for comment. Senior officials 
from the commission's Enforcement and Consumer & Governmental Affairs 
Bureaus provided oral comments. FCC generally concurred with our 
recommendations and noted that they have already begun taking steps to 
address our recommendations. FCC took issue with our conclusion that 
FCC's current process for prioritizing junk fax complaints for 
enforcement does not identify major alleged violators and repeat 
offenders. However, we reiterate that EB's spreadsheet contains less 
than half of the total number of junk fax complaints received and 
contains almost none of the Internet complaints. FCC has done no 
analysis to determine whether the complaints that have been excluded 
from enforcement consideration involve the same entities they have 
identified as major alleged violators. Moreover, EB relies on its 
spreadsheet to identify repeat offenders by searching the spreadsheet 
for the names or telephone numbers of junk fax violators that have 
already been warned by FCC with a citation to cease their activities. 
Since EB is using a subset of all complaint information received for 
this search, it is likely repeat offenders are being missed. In 
addition, this limited search process is not as effective since even 
one additional violation makes the repeat offender subject to further 
enforcement action, including monetary forfeitures. FCC also provided 
technical comments that were incorporated throughout this report as 
appropriate. 

Background: 

In 1991, Congress enacted TCPA to address a growing number of telephone 
marketing calls and certain telemarketing practices thought to be an 
invasion of consumer privacy and, in some cases, costly to consumers. 
Provisions of this law generally prohibit anyone from faxing 
unsolicited advertisements, or "junk faxes," to consumers or 
businesses. An unsolicited advertisement under TCPA was defined as "any 
material advertising the commercial availability or quality of any 
property, goods, or services which is transmitted to any person without 
that person's prior express invitation or permission."[Footnote 4] 

In addition, there are three distinct enforcement mechanisms for 
violations of the junk fax provisions.[Footnote 5] First, persons or 
entities that believe they have been sent a fax in violation of the act 
have a private right of action--that is, they can sue the fax 
advertiser in an appropriate court for damages and/or injunctive 
relief.[Footnote 6] Second, a state attorney general (or another 
official or agency designated by the state) may bring a civil lawsuit 
for damages and/or injunctive relief when a case involves a pattern or 
practice of violations.[Footnote 7] Third, FCC is authorized to assess 
and enforce a "forfeiture" against those who violate the junk fax 
provisions--that is, a monetary penalty against the faxer for violating 
the junk fax rules.[Footnote 8] Appendix I provides a brief overview of 
how unsolicited advertisements sent via telephone, the Internet, and 
cellular telephones are regulated and enforced. 

In 1992, FCC adopted rules implementing TCPA, including restrictions on 
the transmission of junk faxes. In a footnote, the commission concluded 
that entities that have an "established business relationship" (EBR) 
with a recipient can conclude that they have the necessary invitation 
or permission of the recipient to receive the fax 
advertisement.[Footnote 9] The commission defined an EBR to mean the 
following: 

"…a prior or existing relationship formed by a voluntary two-way 
communication between a person or entity and a residential subscriber 
with or without an exchange of consideration, on the basis of an 
inquiry, application, purchase or transaction by the residential 
subscriber regarding products or services offered by such person or 
entity, which relationship has not been previously terminated by either 
party."[Footnote 10] 

In July 2003, FCC revised many of its telemarketing and fax advertising 
rules under TCPA. In part, the commission reversed its prior conclusion 
about an EBR, stating that its existence alone does not constitute the 
express permission required by TCPA. Instead, the commission concluded 
that a fax advertiser must first obtain written permission, including 
the recipient's signature, before a fax can be sent. This requirement 
for written permission was stayed by FCC pending reconsideration and, 
to date, has not taken effect.[Footnote 11] 

Congress has now settled the question of whether prior written consent 
is explicitly required with the Junk Fax Prevention Act of 2005. The 
act (1) amends TCPA and codifies the EBR by expressly permitting 
businesses or entities to fax unsolicited advertisements to those with 
whom they have an EBR and (2) provides that prior permission may be in 
writing or otherwise. The act does, however, impose new disclosure and 
opt-out requirements on advertisers. Businesses or entities sending fax 
advertisements must now include on the first page of the ad an opt-out 
notice, the date and time the fax was sent, the registered name of the 
company sending the fax, and the telephone number of the company 
sending the fax or the sending fax machine's telephone number. The opt- 
out notice should clearly state that the recipient may opt out of any 
future faxes and provide clear instructions for doing so. The opt-out 
telephone number must be domestic and free of charge to the 
recipient.[Footnote 12] 

Some businesses and individuals contract with fax broadcaster (also 
known as "fax blasters") companies that transmit mass fax 
advertisements for others. This practice is legitimate if the fax 
broadcaster complies with the junk fax rules. In some instances, 
however, fax broadcasters fax unsolicited advertisements to parties 
that have no EBR with the advertising company. According to Verizon 
officials in an FCC filing, fax broadcasters often use automatic 
dialers on outbound fax servers to send large volumes of faxes in a 
short time, often in the middle of the night. Furthermore, their 
dialing lists may include primary residential telephone numbers as well 
as fax numbers. For example, according to these officials, one fax 
broadcaster transmitted 10,600 calls over Verizon's network within 10 
minutes. 

Two FCC bureaus--CGB and EB--are primarily responsible for developing 
and implementing rules and procedures to collect and analyze junk fax 
complaints and for conducting investigations and enforcement, among 
their other responsibilities. CGB develops and implements FCC's 
consumer policies. CGB also addresses consumers' informal inquiries and 
works to mediate and resolve complaints under FCC's 
jurisdiction.[Footnote 13] These include complaints about the 
commission's regulated entities, including common carrier, broadcast, 
wireless, satellite, and cable companies; complaints about unauthorized 
changes in telecommunications providers (slamming); complaints about 
unwanted e-mail messages on wireless devices such as mobile telephones 
(spamming); and six types of TCPA-related complaints, including junk 
faxes, violations of the do-not-call list, and time-of- day violations 
(marketing between 9 p.m. and 8 a.m).[Footnote 14] 

EB is responsible for enforcing TCPA's provisions and the commission's 
rules and orders. EB handles three major areas of enforcement: local 
competition, public safety and homeland security, and consumer 
protection. Enforcement officials said that they follow FCC's guidance 
on how to prioritize these responsibilities, and that these priorities 
can change as required by circumstances. EB's Telecommunications 
Consumers Division is responsible for considering junk fax complaints 
for investigation and enforcement.[Footnote 15] 

EB uses several procedures to select complaints for investigation and 
possible enforcement. EB's formal enforcement actions consist of 
several sequential steps. First, EB issues a citation, which notifies 
the faxer of the complaint(s) against it and informs the faxer that its 
alleged activity is illegal. The citation also states that further such 
activity could make the faxer subject to a forfeiture action.[Footnote 
16] If FCC receives additional complaints against the faxer for 
violations of the junk fax rules and substantiates the complaints, EB 
may pursue the forfeiture action.[Footnote 17] This could lead to the 
involvement of the Department of Justice (DOJ), which is responsible 
for collection. Figure 1 depicts FCC's process for responding to junk 
fax complaints. 

Figure 1: FCC's Process for Responding to Junk Fax Complaints: 

[See PDF for image] 

[End of figure] 

FCC Has Recorded a Growing Number of Junk Fax Complaints, but Has Taken 
Limited Enforcement Action to Date: 

In 2000, FCC recorded about 2,200 junk fax complaints; in 2005, that 
number had grown to more than 46,000. Despite this growth in junk fax 
complaints, the numbers of investigations and enforcement actions have 
generally remained the same. 

FCC's Consumer & Governmental Affairs Bureau Has Received an Increasing 
Number of Junk Fax Complaints, Especially through Internet Forms: 

In 2000, CGB began using a new database to record the various types of 
consumer complaints under FCC's jurisdiction, including complaints 
about TCPA violations. For junk fax complaints, CGB staff accept the 
complaints; enter information into the database; and scan the materials 
submitted with the complaints, including copies of the alleged junk 
faxes. CGB staff mail a letter to the majority of complainants 
acknowledging FCC's receipt of their complaint. The letter states that 
FCC does not resolve individual complaints and cannot award monetary or 
other damages directly to the complainant. The letter also states that 
the complainant has the right to take private legal action against any 
junk fax violator.[Footnote 18] 

In 2000, FCC recorded about 2,200 complaints; in 2005, that number had 
grown to more than 46,000. Since 2002, FCC has reported quarterly on 
the number of consumer complaints received, consolidating all six types 
of TCPA complaints into one category. As a result, the number of junk 
fax complaints has never been separately reported. Using CGB data, we 
found that within the specific category of TCPA complaints, junk faxes 
represented over 85 percent of the complaints logged in 2005. In fact, 
when looking at all types of reported consumer complaints, junk fax 
complaints have ranked as the second most frequently reported since 
2003--second only to complaints about indecency and obscenity in radio 
and television broadcasting.[Footnote 19] Appendix II lists the number 
of complaints reported publicly by FCC, by type, from 2003 through 2005 
and details the percentage of the TCPA complaints that are junk fax 
complaints. 

Both individual consumers and businesses can report junk fax complaints 
to the commission by e-mail, postal mail, fax, telephone, or the 
Internet (using an on-line complaint form--Form 475--that appears on 
FCC's Web site). FCC documents both the type of complainant (individual 
consumer or business) and the method of reporting (e-mail, postal mail, 
fax, telephone, or the Internet). Figure 2 shows the number of junk fax 
complaints that businesses and individuals reported through various 
methods from 2003 through 2005. As the figures indicate, the number of 
junk fax complaints reported by businesses dropped in 2005, but the 
number of complaints reported by individuals increased, bringing the 
total for both groups significantly higher in 2005 than in prior years. 
Additionally, the number of complaints reported using the on-line 
complaint form has increased, especially for individual consumers. In 
2005, about half of all junk fax complaints were reported via the 
Internet. 

Figure 2: Number of Individual Consumer and Business Junk Fax 
Complaints, by Method Submitted to FCC, 2003-2005: 

[See PDF for image] 

[End of figure] 

In their junk fax complaints to FCC, individuals and businesses often 
described the adverse effects of junk faxes. We looked at hundreds of 
complainant comments received from September through December 2005 and 
found complaints that cited the costs of toner and paper, the 
disruption of business activities during junk fax transmissions, and 
interruptions to personal lives. For example, the complainants 
expressed frustration about calls coming in the middle of the night and 
waking them up or causing panic. FCC has recently addressed this 
issue.[Footnote 20] Some complainants noted problems with the opt-out 
number--that is, the telephone number that they should be able to call 
to stop receiving the faxes. For example, the opt-out number did not 
work, was always busy, or was connected to a prerecorded 
message.[Footnote 21] According to some complainants, calling the opt- 
out number seemed to increase the number of junk faxes they received. 
Additionally, some complainants expressed frustration with the 
commission's response to their prior complaints. 

Some complainants described junk faxes they had received as 
unbelievable or potentially fraudulent. Among the frequently cited 
topics were hot stocks, cheap vacations, low-interest mortgages, and 
low-cost health care. We asked FCC officials whether they believed 
fraud was an issue with junk faxes. They said that, although 
enforcement related to fraud falls outside of FCC's jurisdiction, some 
of the faxes advertising stock tips could be fraudulent and come under 
the jurisdiction of the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC). 
Federal Trade Commission (FTC) staff, whom we also asked about fraud in 
connection with junk faxes, said they believed it was a concern and 
they cited travel and mortgage offers. FTC staff also mentioned pump- 
and-dump marketing schemes, which they also noted would come under 
SEC's jurisdiction.[Footnote 22] 

FCC's Enforcement Bureau Has Generally Issued a Limited Number of 
Citations Each Year since 2000 and Has Rarely Issued Forfeiture Orders: 

FCC's EB, established in November 1999, is responsible for 
investigating and determining the appropriate enforcement action for 
all types of TCPA complaints, including junk fax complaints. Currently, 
EB dedicates 11 staff (9 full-time analysts and 2 part-time attorneys) 
to work on junk fax enforcement. According to EB officials, the 
bureau's overall staffing levels have remained relatively stable over 
the years. As a result, the staffing level for junk fax enforcement has 
remained about the same over the past 5 years, even though the number 
of junk fax complaints has rapidly increased. 

Because of the large number of complaints and limited resources, EB 
does not investigate each junk fax complaint. Instead, EB officials 
said, they try to identify and take enforcement action against the 
major alleged violators and repeat offenders who, they believe, have 
had the greatest impact on consumers. EB defines a major alleged 
violator as a company, carrier, or individual that has sent a large 
number of junk faxes to complainants over a given period of time; it 
defines a repeat offender as a company, carrier, or individual that 
continues to violate the junk fax rules after receiving a citation from 
the commission. 

To identify major alleged violators, the EB analysts responsible for 
responding to junk fax complaints first review CGB's complaint database 
to identify those complaints with an attached fax.[Footnote 23] EB 
officials said they use only complaints with attached faxes because 
they contain the best evidence for starting an investigation. The 
analysts then transfer information from the complaint and the fax into 
an enforcement spreadsheet.[Footnote 24] Periodically, the EB analysts 
sort the information in the enforcement spreadsheet to align matching 
telephone numbers and identify those that are repeated most often. 
According to enforcement officials, the most frequently repeated 
telephone numbers are indicative of the major alleged violators that 
are creating the most widespread problems for consumers.[Footnote 25] 
In addition to using EB's spreadsheet to prioritize which complaints 
receive enforcement action, EB will also initiate enforcement action on 
the basis of complaints received from other sources, such as 
congressional offices, FCC commissioners, or state attorneys general. 
In the past year, about half of the citations issued by EB were based, 
at least in part, on referrals from outside sources--the majority of 
these outside sources were Members of Congress. 

The next step in the investigation is for the EB analysts to identify 
the major alleged violators associated with the most frequently 
repeated telephone numbers. Finding their names and addresses involves 
contacting carriers to learn who was paying for the telephone numbers 
from which the alleged junk faxes were sent on the dates the faxes were 
sent. Waiting for this information from the carriers can take several 
days. According to enforcement officials, identifying and locating 
major alleged violators is the most challenging aspect of junk fax 
enforcement. They said that obtaining this information is becoming 
increasingly more challenging because violators have become more adept 
at hiding their identity. As a result, the officials said, the analysts 
have to spend more time on each investigation. 

Once a major alleged violator is identified, the analysts can decide 
whether to begin the formal, two-step enforcement process of citation 
and possible forfeiture action. EB officials said they consider the 
citation to be their most efficient enforcement action because many, 
perhaps the majority, of the violators are unaware that their 
activities are illegal and could lead to monetary forfeitures. As a 
result, the officials said, most violators that receive a citation do 
cease their junk fax activities. However, EB officials could not 
provide data to support this assertion.[Footnote 26] 

EB officials have issued a limited number of citations over the past 6 
years, and the annual number did not change substantially, except in 
2002.[Footnote 27] As table 1 indicates, FCC issued 261 citations 
covering 1,456 junk fax complaints from 2000 through 2005. EB officials 
cited competing demands, personnel reductions, and the increasing skill 
of violators in concealing their identity as reasons for the limited 
number of citations issued. 

Table 1: Citations Issued to Junk Fax Violators, Complaints Resulting 
in a Citation, and Approximate Percentage of Total Annual Complaints 
Resulting in a Citation, 2000-2005: 

Year: 2000; 
Number of citations issued: 29; 
Number of complaints resulting in a citation: 128; 
Approximate percentage of total annual number of complaints resulting 
in a citation: 5.7%. 

Year: 2001; 
Number of citations issued: 18; 
Number of complaints resulting in a citation: 72; 
Approximate percentage of total annual number of complaints resulting 
in a citation: 2.9%. 

Year: 2002; 
Number of citations issued: 120; 
Number of complaints resulting in a citation: 639; 
Approximate percentage of total annual number of complaints resulting 
in a citation: 8.4%. 

Year: 2003; 
Number of citations issued: 32; 
Number of complaints resulting in a citation: 68; 
Approximate percentage of total annual number of complaints resulting 
in a citation: 0.4%. 

Year: 2004; 
Number of citations issued: 38; 
Number of complaints resulting in a citation: 230; 
Approximate percentage of total annual number of complaints resulting 
in a citation: 0.7%. 

Year: 2005; 
Number of citations issued: 24; 
Number of complaints resulting in a citation: 319; 
Approximate percentage of total annual number of complaints resulting 
in a citation: 0.7%. 

Year: Total; 
Number of citations issued: 261; 
Number of complaints resulting in a citation: 1,456; 
Approximate percentage of total annual number of complaints resulting 
in a citation: 1.3%. 

Source: FCC. 

[End of table] 

EB officials also noted that in 2005 the average number of complaints 
that each citation covered increased. They believe this demonstrates EB 
has successfully targeted the major alleged violators. However, as 
shown in table 1, the percentage of the total annual number of 
complaints resulting in a citation has been less than 1 percent since 
2003. 

To identify repeat violators, EB analysts enter citation information 
into their enforcement spreadsheet, including the telephone numbers of 
the citation recipients, and search the information in the spreadsheet 
to identify any complaints sent after the citation date against these 
recipients. If any such complaints are found, the analysts decide 
whether to take the second formal enforcement step--a forfeiture 
action--which begins with the issuance of a notice of apparent 
liability. This notice informs the alleged repeat violator that its 
actions make it liable for forfeiture of a specific dollar 
amount.[Footnote 28] The notice must: 

* be issued within 1 year of the alleged violation(s) that forms the 
basis for the notice; 

* identify each specific statute, rule, order, term, or condition that 
allegedly has been violated; 

* explain how the alleged repeat offender's activities have violated 
the junk fax rules and the dates of the violations; and: 

* specify the amount of the proposed monetary forfeiture.[Footnote 29] 

According to EB officials, their enforcement efforts are hampered by 
the requirement that a notice of apparent liability be issued within 1 
year of an alleged repeat violation. For example, FCC's notice of 
apparent liability against Fax.Com, Inc., stated that although FCC 
received some consumers' correspondences and related declarations 
detailing additional unsolicited advertisements received from Fax.Com, 
FCC was unable to include these violations in the forfeiture action 
because they were beyond the 1-year statute of limitations. This 
statute of limitations is problematic, they said, because it takes 
time, after identifying a repeat violation, to prepare the notice and 
obtain a sworn statement from the complainant verifying that there was 
no EBR with the sender of the fax. FTC staff said that they have a 
statute of limitations of at least 5 years to enforce various 
telemarketing rules by seeking civil penalties, and they agreed with 
FCC that a 1-year statute of limitations was restrictive. 

Within a reasonable period of time, usually within 30 days of receiving 
the notice, the alleged repeat offender must either pay the proposed 
forfeiture in full or file a written response requesting that the 
proposed forfeiture be rescinded or be reduced. If the proposed 
forfeiture penalty is not paid in full in response to the notice, the 
commission, upon considering all relevant information available to it, 
will issue an order (1) canceling or reducing the proposed forfeiture 
or requiring that it be paid in full and (2) stating the date by which 
the forfeiture must be paid. If the recipient of the order fails to pay 
the fine within 30 days from the date it is due, EB staff will refer 
the case to the commission's Office of General Counsel (OGC).[Footnote 
30] 

If the recipient ignores OGC's request for payment, the commission 
refers the forfeiture order to DOJ for collection.[Footnote 31] 

EB officials stated that they have identified eight repeat offenders 
from the 261 citations issued from 2000 through 2005, and that they 
have pursued forfeiture actions against all of the repeat offenders 
they have identified. Six of the eight repeat offenders have received 
forfeiture orders, as detailed in table 2. The amounts of the monetary 
forfeitures have increased, but no forfeitures have been collected to 
date. For various reasons, five of the six forfeitures will never be 
collected. The sixth forfeiture order accounts for about 78 percent of 
the fines FCC has levied.[Footnote 32] 

Table 2: Status of Forfeitures Issued for Repeat Junk Fax Violations, 
2000-2005: 

Company: Get-Aways, Inc; 
Date of forfeiture order: March 2000; 
Number of violations: 19; 
Amount of fine: $85,500; 
Status: Referred to FCC's OGC and DOJ. DOJ closed this case because the 
company filed for bankruptcy. 

Company: Tri Star Marketing, Inc; 
Date of forfeiture order: October 2000; 
Number of violations: 8; 
Amount of fine: $47,000; 
Status: Referred to both OGC and DOJ. DOJ closed this case because 
litigation was not cost-effective considering the amount of potential 
recovery. Also, collection was questionable since Washington State had 
already received a judgment in excess of $2 million dollars against the 
company. 

Company: Carolina Liquidators, Inc; 
Date of forfeiture order: November 2000; 
Number of violations: 34; 
Amount of fine: $230,000; 
Status: Referred to both OGC and DOJ. DOJ closed this case because the 
company or its principal could not be found. 

Company: U.S. Notary, Inc; 
Date of forfeiture order: October 2001; 
Number of violations: 26; 
Amount of fine: $90,000; 
Status: Referred to both OGC and DOJ. DOJ closed this case because the 
company was out of business and unable to pay its debt. 

Company: 21[ST] Century Faxes; 
Date of forfeiture order: January 2002; 
Number of violations: 152; 
Amount of fine: $1,107,500; 
Status: Referred to both OGC and DOJ. DOJ closed this case because 
faxes were transmitted from outside the United States.[A]. 

Company: Fax.Com, Inc; 
Date of forfeiture order: January 2004; 
Number of violations: 489; 
Amount of fine: $5,379,000; 
Status: Referred to both OGC and DOJ. Litigation is ongoing. FCC staff 
is assisting DOJ to seek collection of the forfeiture. 

Source: FCC. 

[A] In 2003, Congress extended the reach of TCPA to violations by 
persons outside of the United States if the recipient is within the 
United States. Pub. L. No. 108-187, § 12, 117 Stat. 2717 (2003). 

[End of table] 

Two additional enforcement actions were taken in early 2006, outside 
the scope of our review. The remaining two forfeiture actions that EB 
began are against Elf Painting and Wallpaper (Elf) and First Choice 
Healthcare, Inc. (First Choice). FCC issued a notice of apparent 
liability to Elf in December 2004 for continuing to send junk faxes 
after receiving a citation in February 2003. The notice proposed a 
penalty of $22,500 for five specific violations of the junk fax rules. 
A final forfeiture order issuing a fine of $22,500 was released by FCC 
against Elf on March 10, 2006. In February 2006, FCC issued a notice of 
apparent liability against First Choice, proposing a fine of $776,500 
against the company for sending at least 98 unsolicited fax 
advertisements after receiving a citation in July 2004. 

FCC's Procedures Have Emphasized Customer Service and Documentation, 
but Enforcement Is Hampered by Multiple Factors: 

The strengths of FCC's junk fax procedures are that CGB has emphasized 
both customer service and documentation of consumers' complaints; 
however, these processes are resource-intensive and susceptible to 
error. Additionally, CGB's database contains detailed information about 
complaints, but does not present the information in a way that meets 
EB's enforcement needs. While EB's approach to making investigation and 
enforcement decisions is designed to make efficient use of limited 
enforcement resources, it does not consider or factor in the majority 
of complaints. 

Focus on Customer Service and Documentation Is Time-consuming, and Data 
Entry Errors May Occur: 

CGB has emphasized customer service by establishing multiple methods 
for consumers to report junk fax complaints to FCC, providing multiple 
sources of information about junk fax issues, and sending a letter in 
response to the majority of the junk fax complaints. As previously 
discussed, consumers can report junk fax complaints by postal mail, 
telephone, fax, e-mail, and the Internet. FCC also staffs two consumer 
centers to handle consumer inquiries and provide junk fax guidance. 
This guidance is located in several places, including FCC's Web page, a 
consumer fact sheet, and the Internet consumer complaint form (Form 
475). The letter that FCC sends in response to complaints further 
advises consumers of their legal options for addressing their 
complaints. 

CGB consolidates and maintains information about complaints in its 
database, together with any attachments. According to CGB officials, 
the database has improved CGB's coding and counting of TCPA complaints. 
However, entering complaint information into the database is time- 
consuming. Data from complaints reported by postal mail, e-mail, fax, 
and telephone must be entered manually, while data reported on FCC's 
Internet complaint form (Form 475) can be electronically transferred 
from the form to the database. However, CGB staff still have to review 
the complaint summary from the consumer's complaint (by opening a text 
box from the Form 475) to determine what type of TCPA violation is 
being reported. As figure 3 shows, the form includes a text box that 
asks the complainant, among other things, to describe the type of 
violation.[Footnote 33] CGB staff then have to analyze the consumer's 
comment and manually code the type of TCPA violation into the database. 

Figure 3: FCC Form 475: Internet Complaint Form for General- 
Communications Related Issues: 

[See PDF for image] 

[End of figure] 

Besides being time-consuming, CGB's data entry processes may cause 
errors in the database, despite the periodic supervisory review that 
CGB officials told us takes place. For example, errors can occur in 
coding complaints, matching complaints with associated attachments, and 
dating complaints. These problems may, to an unknown extent, affect the 
reliability of CGB's complaint counts. They also may impact the quality 
of the report that FCC is now required to provide to Congress on the 
number of junk fax complaints received each year. Given the large 
numbers of complaints, we do believe that overall trends can be 
reported, but the specific numbers may not be accurate. 

Errors in coding complaints can occur if the complainant's comments on 
the Form 475 do not provide CGB staff with sufficient information to 
determine what type of violation should be coded in the database, or if 
the CGB staff simply miscode a comment. In a cursory review of 2005 
complaint data, we found several instances in which an Internet 
complaint was miscoded. For example, CGB's database incorrectly 
identified one Internet complaint as a junk fax complaint, even though 
the complainant was asking for assistance in having charges removed 
that resulted from unsolicited advertisements sent as text messages to 
the complainant's cellular telephone. 

Errors may also occur in matching complaints submitted by telephone, e- 
mail, or the Internet with the associated faxes sent to FCC separately 
by postal mail. Unless the consumer writes on the fax the unique 
identifier that CGB assigns to every complaint on the fax and CGB staff 
scan the fax into the database with the original complaint, the fax may 
be entered into the database as a new complaint. CGB officials 
acknowledged that these types of errors could be occurring, but they 
could not estimate the extent of the problem. 

CGB's Database Does Not Meet EB's Enforcement Needs, Leading to 
Duplicate Data Entry and Demonstrating Limited Coordination: 

Although CGB's database contains detailed information about complaints, 
the database does not present the information in a way that meets EB's 
enforcement needs. According to EB officials, CGB's database does not 
meet EB's enforcement needs because it does not contain separate fields 
for all of the information EB requires, and not all fields of the 
database can be easily searched.[Footnote 34] For example, the database 
does not contain separate fields for the names of the businesses or 
individuals that may have sent the junk faxes or for their telephone 
numbers.[Footnote 35] Most of this information, if included in the 
complaint, has been entered into a comment field manually by CGB staff 
or transferred electronically from a text box on the Form 475. To find 
the most frequently reported businesses or individuals (major alleged 
violators), EB staff would have to use the "Find" feature to search the 
comment fields for one name or telephone number at a time. 

Because CGB's database does not contain the data fields that EB needs 
for enforcement, EB has developed a separate spreadsheet that contains 
the requisite data fields and allows the data to be searched and sorted 
to support EB's enforcement activities. This spreadsheet is not linked 
in any way to CGB's database. Consequently, EB analysts manually enter 
the data they need from CGB's database and from the faxes scanned in as 
attachments to CGB's database. Furthermore, since the type of 
attachment is not identified in the database, EB analysts have to open 
each attachment to determine whether it is a fax. According to EB 
officials, the 9 EB analysts who work on junk fax complaints spend 
about half their time on data entry and the remainder of their time on 
enforcement activities. 

This duplication of data management activities demonstrates that 
limited coordination has taken place between CGB and EB in determining 
how best to manage junk fax complaint data. For example, CGB staff 
currently have no follow-up procedures to obtain any additional 
information from junk fax complainants that may assist in 
investigations and enforcement.[Footnote 36] In addition, EB staff 
acknowledged that maintaining a separate spreadsheet takes resources 
away from investigation and enforcement. 

Practice of Limiting Consideration for Enforcement to Complaints with 
Attached Faxes Has Excluded the Majority of Reported Complaints: 

EB's practice is to investigate and consider taking enforcement action 
only when a fax is provided with a complaint. As previously noted, 
according to EB officials, a fax is not needed to issue a citation but 
may be needed for other formal enforcement actions. EB staff enter data 
into their spreadsheet only for those complaints from CGB's database 
that have an attached fax. As figure 4 indicates, the majority of the 
junk fax complaints in CGB's database for every year from 2003 through 
2005 did not have an attachment.[Footnote 37] The remaining complaints 
had an attachment that may or may not have been a fax.[Footnote 38] For 
2005, about 60 percent of the complaints--including almost all of the 
complaints reported via the Internet--did not have an attachment and, 
therefore, under EB's practice, would not have been included in EB's 
enforcement spreadsheet. As a result, EB would not have included these 
complaints in its searches for major alleged violators or repeat 
offenders or considered them in its decisions about investigation or 
enforcement.[Footnote 39] 

Figure 4: Number of Junk Fax Complaints with an Attachment That Could 
Be a Fax, 2003-2005: 

[See PDF for image] 

[End of figure] 

With the majority of reported complaints excluded from EB's review, the 
chances of identifying repeat offenders--those who have already 
received a citation or a notice of apparent liability from FCC but have 
continued to send junk faxes--are more limited.[Footnote 40] We 
searched CGB's 2005 complaint data for selected company names and 
telephone numbers from issued citations, using the "Find" feature, and 
found several complaints alleging violations by citation recipients 
dated after the citations were issued. However, none of these 
complaints had an attachment, and we did not find these repeat 
offenders when we searched EB's spreadsheet. In addition, we found six 
complaints of violations by Elf Painting and Wallpaper that postdated 
the notice of apparent liability issued to this firm in December 2004. 
The most recent complaint was dated November 2005. However, these 
complaints were all reported via the Internet and lacked an attachment; 
therefore, like the 2005 complaints we found against the other citation 
recipients, they may not have been found in a search of EB's 
spreadsheet. 

Compounding this problem is FCC's consumer guidance on submitting junk 
fax complaints. Some of this guidance encourage consumers to send in 
the junk faxes they have received. However, none of the guidance state 
that without a fax, EB analysts do not review a complaint, include it 
in their investigations, consider it for enforcement action, or include 
it in their searches for repeat offenders. 

For example, FCC's junk fax fact sheet and consumer center staff 
guidance both encourage complainants to send in the fax if possible, as 
the following excerpt from both documents indicates: 

"If you have received unsolicited faxes, you are encouraged to contact 
the FCC regarding the incident(s). You may need to provide 
documentation in support of your complaint, such as copies of the 
fax(es) you received.…Your complaint should include:..a copy of the fax 
advertisement, if possible, or confirmation that you have retained a 
copy of the fax.…" 

By contrast, the form for reporting complaints via the Internet says 
nothing about sending in a copy of the fax to FCC and does not tell 
complainants how to do so. As shown in figure 2, the Form 475 is 
designed for consumers to report a wide variety of telephone 
complaints. As a result, much of the information the form provides, as 
well as the information it seeks from consumers, does not apply to junk 
fax complaints. Only the last section of the form applies to junk fax 
complaints. 

Our review of a portion of CGB's 2005 complaint data revealed that 
several consumers who reported junk fax complaints via the Internet 
were frustrated because they could not attach the faxes they had 
received to the form and could not find any guidance on how to send the 
faxes to FCC. For example, some consumers said they had kept copies of 
the faxes but did not know how to send them to FCC. Other consumers 
asked FCC to contact them to let them know how to send the faxes. 

Both CGB and EB officials said they do not explicitly state that a fax 
is needed for enforcement because they do not want to discourage 
consumers who no longer have the fax from sending in a complaint. In 
some instances, consumers who received a junk fax may not have kept the 
fax. In addition, CGB officials said the Form 475 asks for all of the 
information from the fax that is useful for EB to consider for possible 
investigatory action or to issue a citation, such as the telephone 
number of the company or individual that sent the fax and the "opt-out" 
numbers provided on the fax. However, enforcement officials will not 
see this information because, under current practice, they are only 
looking for complaints that have an attached fax to transfer to the EB 
spreadsheet, regardless of how complete the information is on the Form 
475. 

FCC Faces Management Challenges in Carrying Out Its Junk Fax 
Responsibilities: 

Congress passed the Government Performance and Results Act of 1993 
(GPRA)[Footnote 41] to require federal agencies to take specific steps 
to improve their performance. In general, GPRA sets forth recognized 
performance management practices that agencies can apply in carrying 
out their governmental responsibilities. These practices include 
establishing long-term strategic goals and annual goals, measuring 
performance in meeting these goals, and reporting publicly on the 
agency's progress.[Footnote 42] These performance management practices 
are critical in helping an agency determine how well it is achieving 
intended outcomes. FCC does not appear to be applying this model to its 
junk fax monitoring and enforcement activities and, therefore, lacks an 
important tool for assessing and reporting its progress. 

The agency has not indicated, for example, whether its focus is to 
decrease the number of junk fax complaints received, increase the 
number of formal enforcement actions, or improve consumer guidance on 
how to stop junk faxes. FCC's strategic goal includes a target for 
reducing the amount of time it takes to respond to consumer complaints; 
however, this goal may be encouraging FCC to shift its focus from 
monitoring and enforcement to customer service. CGB officials 
maintained, for example, that they generally send a letter to 
complainants within 2 to 3 days acknowledging that FCC has received 
their complaint. While this letter provides complainants with 
information on alternative enforcement mechanisms under the law--that 
is, their private right of action and a civil action brought by their 
state attorney general--it does not seek additional information from 
them, if needed, to pursue an FCC enforcement action. Furthermore, once 
CGB has responded to a complaint with the acknowledgment letter, it 
codes the complaint as a closed case for CGB purposes, meaning that 
these data can be purged from the database after 2 years. As a result, 
these data are no longer available for use in identifying major alleged 
violators and repeat offenders or for identifying and monitoring trends 
in complaints and assessing the effects of enforcement actions. 

FCC is not using the information on junk fax complaints that it 
collects to measure its performance in carrying out its junk fax 
responsibilities. Although CGB allocates considerable staff and other 
resources to entering complaint data into its database, FCC is not 
analyzing these data and using the results of its analyses to set 
priorities and allocate resources. For example, it is not monitoring 
the number of junk fax complaints recorded each year. Thus, FCC's 
quarterly reports identify the total number of TCPA complaints, but do 
not break out the total for each of the six types of TCPA 
complaints.[Footnote 43] As a result, the quarterly reports mask the 
magnitude of the junk fax problem, which, as our analysis indicates, 
accounts for about 85 percent of all TCPA complaints received in 2005. 
In addition, the reports do not indicate that junk fax complaints are 
the second most frequently recorded type of consumer complaint overall. 
Without analyzing the data it collects to determine the relative 
frequency of junk fax and other types of complaints, FCC is limited in 
its ability to determine whether its staff and other resources are 
appropriately aligned to address the problems consumers are 
experiencing. 

Additionally, FCC is not analyzing the nature of the principal types of 
junk fax problems complainants are reporting. This information appears 
in a comment field, where CGB staff enter comments provided by 
complainants, but the information cannot be analyzed electronically. As 
a result, FCC may not be able to fully address concerns such as the 
percentages of complainants who reported that they were continuing to 
receive junk faxes after calling the opt-out number or who were 
receiving junk faxes in the middle of the night. Furthermore, FCC 
cannot identify and monitor trends in complaints and enforcement and, 
therefore, cannot target its resources to complainants' greatest 
concerns or evaluate its own performance in addressing those concerns. 
Having information on the nature and frequency of problems with opt-out 
numbers and FCC's success in addressing these problems is particularly 
important because Congress, in the 2005 Act, required the opt-out 
number to protect consumers from repeated unwanted faxes. FCC officials 
stated that these issues will be addressed once the new junk fax rules 
are implemented. 

Without analysis, FCC cannot explore the need for, or implement, 
changes to its rules, procedures, or consumer guidance that might help 
deter junk fax violations or give consumers a better understanding of 
the junk fax rules. We found, for example, from our review of comments 
in CGB's database from 2005, that many complainants seemed to believe 
the National Do-Not-Call Registry applies to fax numbers as well as 
their home telephone numbers. Repeatedly, complainants reported that 
they had asked to have their fax numbers placed on this list, and they 
did not understand why they were still receiving junk faxes. FTC, 
together with FCC, implemented this list in 2003 to protect consumers 
from unwanted telemarketing calls. FTC staff explained that the list 
does not apply to fax numbers--that is, telemarketers must consult this 
list before placing covered calls to consumers, but senders of fax 
advertisements are not required to consult the list before faxing. FTC 
has provided guidance to consumers that fax numbers are not covered 
under the National Do-Not-Call Registry. Despite the many comments in 
CGB's database indicative of complainants' misunderstanding, FCC has 
not considered this issue in a rulemaking context or revised all of its 
guidance to clarify whether the National Do-Not-Call Registry is 
applicable to fax advertising.[Footnote 44] 

Most important, without establishing performance goals and measures and 
without analyzing complaint and enforcement data, it is not possible to 
explore the effectiveness of current enforcement measures. Without 
first gaining an understanding of the effectiveness of current 
enforcement measures, it is similarly not possible to determine whether 
additional enforcement measures are necessary to protect consumers. 

Conclusions: 

Consumer frustration with junk faxes is evident in the rapidly 
increasing number of complaints and in the time that consumers are 
willing to take to seek relief from this type of unsolicited 
advertising. FCC has provided consumers with several methods to submit 
their complaints about junk faxes and several sources of consumer 
information about junk faxes, and it promptly acknowledges receipt of 
most of the complaints. However, despite collecting thousands of junk 
fax complaints, including the information submitted with them, FCC has 
taken formal enforcement actions against relatively few junk faxers. 
More important, FCC is simply not considering the majority of 
complaints or any of the information contained in those complaints when 
making decisions about investigations and enforcement. 

We acknowledge that FCC cannot be expected to take enforcement action 
against every junk fax complaint received. The growth in complaints, 
together with limited resources, would make such an effort both 
impossible and impractical. However, FCC has put in place data 
collection and management processes that contain clear inefficiencies 
and limit its ability to target major alleged violators and repeat 
offenders. Overall, there has been limited collaboration between CGB 
and EB to ensure that FCC's data processes are efficient, make the 
fullest use of the data collected, and fully support the needs of EB. 

FCC is not making use of performance management tools to improve its 
junk fax enforcement. There are no goals or measures of success for 
handling complaints or for investigating them and taking enforcement 
action. More fundamentally, FCC has not done the analysis that would 
help it to establish such goals and measures. Without analyzing the 
complaint data, FCC does not know if it could be doing more to better 
target its limited resources to address the concerns of consumers, such 
as seeking out faxers that may be providing fake opt-out numbers or 
providing clearer guidance to consumers on the impact of time 
restrictions and the National Do-Not-Call Registry on junk fax 
concerns. FCC also has not established what it needs to do to be able 
to completely and accurately report the number of complaints it has 
received in carrying out its junk fax responsibilities as required 
under the 2005 Act. Because FCC's junk fax enforcement efforts have 
data management issues, lack data analysis, and lack performance goals 
and measures, it is not possible to determine whether any additional 
enforcement measures would better protect consumers and businesses from 
receiving junk faxes. FCC simply cannot say whether its junk fax 
enforcement efforts are successful in combating junk fax advertising. 
However, the steady number of citations issued from year to year should 
be cause for concern in the face of the rising number of junk fax 
complaints. 

Recommendations for Executive Action: 

FCC's current consumer guidance does not alert consumers to the 
necessity, under FCC's current practice, of submitting a copy of the 
junk fax(es) along with the complaint. Because this impacts the number 
of complaints that FCC takes into consideration when searching for 
major alleged violators and repeat offenders, we recommend that the 
Chairman of the Federal Communications Commission direct staff to take 
the following two actions: 

* Revise consumer complaint guidance to make it clear to consumers that 
they need to include a copy of the fax in order to make it possible for 
any investigation or enforcement action to take place. This includes 
revising the wording of the Consumer Fact Sheet, the Internet complaint 
form (Form 475), the consumer center script, and any other junk fax 
guidance provided to consumers. 

* Revise the Form 475 so that it includes clear instructions for 
complainants on how to submit a copy of the fax. This may include 
developing procedures and instructions to let consumers know how to 
electronically attach a scanned copy of the fax so that it accompanies 
their complaint form. 

FCC's current data collection and management processes contain 
inefficiencies and adversely affect FCC's procedures for targeting 
major alleged violators and repeat offenders. To begin to address these 
problems, we recommend that FCC take the following action: 

* Direct consumer and enforcement staff to develop data management 
strategies to (1) make the consumer complaint database more usable for 
FCC's staff and (2) mitigate the amount of time spent on manual data 
entry, as well as possible errors, resulting from this manual data 
entry. For example, these efforts could include, but not be limited to, 
revising the Form 475 so that consumers identify through checked boxes, 
or another similar method, the type of complaint they are filing. This 
could enhance accuracy and improve staff efficiency by eliminating the 
need for FCC staff to read a text box to identify the type of complaint 
and then enter that information into the database. In addition, staff 
should develop strategies that would enable enforcement staff to search 
all consumer complaint information contained in the database to 
identify major and repeat violators. 

Finally, FCC should introduce recognized performance management 
practices into its operations in order to improve the performance of 
its junk fax enforcement efforts. Toward this effort, FCC should take 
the following three actions: 

* Establish goals and performance measures for receiving, 
acknowledging, investigating, and taking enforcement actions on junk 
fax complaints. 

* Use the information in the complaint database to analyze the nature 
and scope of the complaints. FCC can then begin to determine whether 
its current enforcement efforts are sufficient in combating junk 
faxers, and whether any additional enforcement mechanisms might be 
needed to protect consumers. 

* Evaluate whether its staff and other resources are appropriately 
aligned to carry out its junk fax responsibilities. This could include, 
but not be limited to, evaluating the benefits of targeting staff 
resources to issue more citations that could prompt more violators to 
cease their offending behavior. 

Agency Comments and Our Evaluation: 

We provided a draft of this report to FCC for comment. Senior officials 
from the commission's Enforcement and Consumer & Governmental Affairs 
Bureaus provided oral comments. FCC generally concurred with our 
recommendations and noted that they have already begun taking steps to 
address our recommendations. For example, FCC officials stated staff 
have been working to implement a new data management system that will 
in part consolidate all inquiry and complaint data into a new database 
by May 2006. FCC officials said this new database will identify 
possible duplicate complaint records and increase the efficiency of 
processing junk fax inquiries and complaints. They also said 
discussions on developing additional modifications to the new database 
are now under way, including modifications that would eliminate the 
need for EB to have its own enforcement spreadsheet. In the interim, 
FCC officials said CGB and EB staff are planning to link the EB 
spreadsheet to the new database, but the officials could not provide a 
workplan describing how and when this linkage would be accomplished. 

FCC officials said they take issue with our conclusion that FCC's 
current process for prioritizing junk fax complaints for enforcement 
may not identify the major alleged violators and repeat offenders. FCC 
believes that the number of complaints transferred to EB's spreadsheet 
for review, although only a portion of the total number of complaints 
received, is large enough to identify the major alleged violators and 
repeat offenders. We reiterate that EB's spreadsheet contains less than 
half of the total number of junk fax complaints received and contains 
almost none of the Internet complaints. FCC has done no analysis to 
determine whether the complaints that have been excluded from 
enforcement consideration involve the same entities they have 
identified as major alleged violators. Moreover, searching for repeat 
offenders (junk fax violators that have already been warned by FCC to 
cease their activities) using a subset of the complaints received is 
not as effective since even one additional violation makes the entity 
subject to further enforcement action, including monetary forfeiture. 

Since FCC is beginning to explore changes to its database to eliminate 
the need for a separate EB spreadsheet, as previously noted, it is 
possible for FCC to also explore changes to the database that would 
improve EB's ability to analyze all complaint data to better identify 
the major alleged violators, as we have recommended. Improved search 
functions within the database would also aid in identifying the repeat 
offenders. 

FCC officials also said the agency had included a consumer protection 
goal that covered junk fax issues in the agency's 2004 performance 
summary. FCC officials also provided us with 2004 and 2005 CGB goals. 
However, after reviewing these documents, we maintain that FCC does not 
have goals or measures specifically related to junk fax enforcement. We 
reiterate that the introduction of recognized performance management 
practices into FCC's operations could improve the performance of its 
junk fax enforcement efforts. FCC also provided technical comments that 
were incorporated throughout this report as appropriate. 

We are sending copies of this report to interested congressional 
committees and the Chairman, FCC. We will make copies available to 
others upon request. The report is available at no charge on GAO's Web 
site at [Hyperlink, http://www.gao.gov]. 

If you or your staff have any questions concerning this report, please 
contact me on (202) 512-2834 or [Hyperlink, goldsteinm@gao.gov]. 
Contact points for our Offices of Congressional Relations and Public 
Affairs may be found on the last page of this report. Key contributors 
to this report were Faye Morrison, Assistant Director; Kimberly Berry; 
Elizabeth Eisenstadt; Edda Emmanuelli-Perez; Chad Factor; Michele 
Fejfar; Mike Mgebroff; Josh Ormond; Terri Russell; and Mindi 
Weisenbloom. 

Signed by: 

Mark L. Goldstein: 
Director, Physical Infrastructure Issues: 

[End of section] 

Appendixes: 

Appendix I: Statutes Protecting Consumers from Unsolicited 
Advertisements: 

This appendix provides a brief description of how unsolicited 
advertisements provided through commercial telephone calls and e-mails 
are regulated and how the regulations are enforced. 

Regulating Unsolicited Telephone and E-mail Advertisements: 

In response to consumer frustration and dissatisfaction with 
advertising via unsolicited telephone calls and e-mails, Congress has 
passed several statutes directing the Federal Communications Commission 
(FCC) and the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) to regulate unsolicited 
advertisements delivered by telephone or e-mail. The Telephone Consumer 
Protection Act of 1991 is FCC's basic statutory mandate with respect to 
telemarketers and applies to unwanted telemarketing calls and facsimile 
(fax) solicitations.[Footnote 45] The Telemarketing and Consumer Fraud 
and Abuse Prevention Act of 1994 is FTC's specific statutory mandate 
regarding telemarketing.[Footnote 46] The Controlling Assault of Non- 
Solicited Pornography & Marketing Act of 2003 (CAN-SPAM Act) provides 
FTC with the authority to regulate commercial e-mails whose "primary 
purpose" is the "commercial advertising or promoting of a commercial 
product or service."[Footnote 47] FCC has authority under the CAN-SPAM 
Act to regulate unsolicited commercial messages on wireless 
devices.[Footnote 48] Thus, FCC's and FTC's enforcements are based upon 
different statutory authority. 

FCC's enforcement efforts are generally accomplished through an 
administrative process. FTC's enforcement actions are usually filed in 
federal district court and seek injunctive relief; consumer redress; 
and, in some circumstances, civil penalties. The latter actions are 
filed by the Department of Justice (DOJ) on behalf of FTC. Both 
commissions can obtain civil penalties up to $11,000 per violation. 

FCC - The Telephone Consumer Protection Act of 1991: 

The Telephone Consumer Protection Act of 1991 (TCPA) was created in 
response to consumer concerns about the growing number of unsolicited 
telemarketing calls to their homes and the increasing use of automated 
and prerecorded messages. FCC's rules under that act prohibit telephone 
solicitation calls to homes between the hours of 9 p.m. and 8 a.m. 
Also, under the rules, anyone making a call to a home, must provide his 
or her name, the name of the person or entity on whose behalf the call 
is being made, and a telephone number or address at which the person or 
entity may be contacted. These telemarketing rules do not apply to 
calls or messages placed with a consumer's prior expressed permission, 
by or on behalf of a tax-exempt nonprofit organization, or from a 
person or organization with whom the consumer has an established 
business relationship (EBR). TCPA telephone solicitation violations are 
enforced in the same manner as TCPA junk fax violations. 

FTC - The Telemarketing and Consumer Fraud and Abuse Prevention Act of 
1994: 

The purpose of the Telemarketing and Consumer Fraud and Abuse 
Prevention Act of 1994 was to combat telemarketing fraud by providing 
law enforcement agencies with new tools and to give consumers new 
protections. The act directed FTC to issue a rule prohibiting deceptive 
and abusive telemarketing acts or practices, and specified, among other 
things, certain acts or practices FTC's rule must address, including 
"…unsolicited telephone calls which the reasonable consumer would 
consider coercive or abusive of such consumer's right to 
privacy."[Footnote 49] 

FTC issued its original Telemarketing Sales Rule (TSR) in 1995. TSR 
requires certain disclosures and prohibits misrepresentations. Some of 
the provisions of the rule will include the following: (1) the rule 
restricts calls to the hours between 8:00 a.m. and 9:00 p.m; (2) the 
rule forbids telemarketers from calling consumers if they have been 
asked not to call; and (3) the rule requires certain prompt 
disclosures, prohibits certain misrepresentations and lying to get 
consumers to pay, and makes it illegal for a telemarketer to withdraw 
money directly from a checking account without the account holder's 
specific, verifiable authorization. The TSR rule was amended in 2003. 
The amended TSR established the National Do-Not-Call Registry. In 
addition, the amended TSR places restrictions on unauthorized billing, 
reduces abandoned calls, and requires caller identification 
transmissions.[Footnote 50] 

Several types of calls are expressly exempted from TSR coverage, 
including calls initiated by consumers in response to direct mail 
(provided certain disclosures are made), calls initiated by consumers 
in response to advertisements in the general media (such as newspapers 
or media), and business-to-business calls.[Footnote 51] Catalog sales 
calls also are exempt. 

Under the statute, violations of TSR are treated as "unfair or 
deceptive acts or practices in violation of the FTC Act."[Footnote 52] 
FTC's enforcement actions generally are accomplished by seeking 
injunctive relief and consumer redress. Under some circumstances (e.g., 
do-not-call violations), injunctions and sometimes civil penalties (up 
to $11,000 per violation) are sought. Actions seeking civil penalties 
are filed by DOJ on behalf of FTC and are less common. FTC itself files 
and litigates its actions seeking injunctive relief and consumer 
redress. 

States, through their attorneys general, may bring civil actions on 
behalf of their residents to enjoin the violation; enforce compliance 
with TSR; obtain damages, restitution, or other compensation on behalf 
of residents; and obtain such other relief as the court may deem 
appropriate.[Footnote 53] Private parties may also bring a civil action 
within 3 years after discovery of the violation, if the amount in 
controversy exceeds the sum or value of $50,000 in actual damages for 
each person adversely affected by such telemarketing. Such an action 
may be brought to enjoin such telemarketing, enforce compliance with 
any rule, obtain damages, or obtain such additional and other relief as 
the court may deem appropriate.[Footnote 54] 

The National Do-Not-Call Registry: 

In January 2002, FTC proposed a National Do-Not-Call registry. One year 
later, FTC amended its TSR to create the national registry and prohibit 
covered telemarketing calls to consumers who registered their telephone 
numbers. FCC revised its regulations pursuant to TCPA in June 2003, 
requiring telemarketers under its jurisdiction to comply with the 
requirements of the national registry. 

In March 2003, Congress passed the Do-Not-Call Implementation Act, 
which authorized FTC to establish fees "sufficient to implement and 
enforce" the national registry.[Footnote 55] In September 2003, in 
response to legal challenges to the national registry and requirements, 
Congress passed additional legislation (1) expressly authorizing FTC to 
implement and enforce a National Do-Not-Call Registry under the 
Telemarketing and Consumer Fraud and Abuse Prevention Act and (2) 
ratifying the National Do-Not-Call Registry regulation as promulgated 
by FTC in 2002.[Footnote 56] 

Under FTC's and FCC's rules, the registry covers both traditional 
(wired) and mobile (wireless) telephones. The registry is national in 
scope, applies to all telemarketers (with the exception of certain 
nonprofit organizations), and covers both interstate and intrastate 
telemarketing calls. Commercial telemarketers are not allowed to call a 
consumer if his or her telephone number is on the registry, unless 
there is an EBR between the seller and the consumer or the consumer has 
given prior written consent to be called.[Footnote 57] Nontelemarketing 
calls, such as political fundraising, market research surveys, or debt 
collection, are not prohibited by the registry's provisions. The 
national registry started accepting consumer telephone number 
registrations in late June 2003,[Footnote 58] and telemarketers began 
accessing the national registry to obtain registered consumer telephone 
numbers in September 2003. FTC and FCC began enforcing the provisions 
of the national registry in October 2003. 

FTC and FCC have different but overlapping jurisdiction over the 
activities of entities that make telemarketing calls. FTC's authority 
under its telemarketing law is limited to entities engaged in 
interstate telemarketing, while FCC's authority covers both intrastate 
and interstate entities. In addition, by statute, certain entities are 
wholly or partially exempt from FTC jurisdiction but remain subject to 
FCC jurisdiction. These entities include common carriers, banks, credit 
unions, saving and loans institutions, airlines, nonprofit 
organizations, and insurance companies. 

FTC and FCC do not take action on every complaint alleging a violation 
of the national registry provision; rather, they consider a number of 
factors--such as the number and persistence or duration of complaints 
filed against a telemarketer, the nature of the claims made by the 
telemarketer, and any past history of complaints or law violations--to 
determine whether to take action against a telemarketer for violations 
of the national registry provision. 

The CAN-SPAM Act of 2003: 

The CAN-SPAM Act of 2003 establishes requirements for those who send 
commercial e-mail, spells out penalties for spammers and companies 
whose products are advertised in spam if they violate the law, and 
gives consumers the right to ask e-mailers to stop spamming 
them.[Footnote 59] The law covers e-mail whose primary purpose is 
advertising or promoting a commercial product or service. A 
"transactional or relationship message" (e.g., an e-mail that 
facilitates an agreed-upon transaction or updates a customer in an EBR) 
may not contain false or misleading routing information, but otherwise 
is exempt from most provisions of the CAN-SPAM Act. State laws 
specifically related to commercial e-mail are preempted. However, state 
laws that are not specifically applicable to e-mail, such as trespass, 
contract, tort law, or state laws that relate to fraud or computer 
crimes, are not preempted.[Footnote 60] 

Under the CAN-SPAM Act's major provisions, false or misleading header 
information is prohibited. An e-mail's "From," "To," and routing 
information (including the originating domain name and e-mail address) 
must be accurate and identify the person who initiated the e-mail. The 
law prohibits deceptive subject lines and requires that the e-mail give 
recipients an opt-out method. Specifically, the sender must provide a 
return e-mail or another Internet-based response mechanism that allows 
a recipient to request that the sender not send future e-mails to the e-
mail address. Senders must honor opt-out requests. Additionally, the 
act requires that the commercial e-mail be identified as an 
advertisement and include the sender's valid physical postal address. 

FTC (and various other agencies) is authorized to enforce the CAN-SPAM 
Act. Each violation is subject to fines of up to $11,000 per violation. 
FTC also responds to deceptive commercial e-mail as a violation of the 
FTC act. State attorneys general, state law enforcement agencies, and 
Internet service providers (ISP) may also bring suit under CAN-SPAM for 
statutorily set damages.[Footnote 61] In a December 2005 report to 
Congress, FTC stated that the commission had brought 20 cases alleging 
violation of the act.[Footnote 62] The report also noted that at the 
state level, three attorneys general have filed a total of three 
actions--one with FTC as a coplaintiff--in federal court, naming 15 
defendants under the CAN-SPAM Act. In addition, the report stated that 
ISPs have also filed CAN-SPAM Act suits initially against more than 100 
known defendants and more than 580 unknown (John Doe) defendants. 

DOJ has the authority to enforce the criminal penalties established 
under the act.[Footnote 63] Criminal penalties may include fines or 
imprisonment. According to the legislative history of the act, 
aggressive civil and criminal enforcement actions were needed to curb 
the growth of spam on all fronts. The criminal provisions were targeted 
to those who use fraudulent and deceptive means to send unwanted e-mail 
messages. The need for these criminal provisions was based, in part, on 
a study by FTC that found that 66 percent of spam contained some kind 
of false, fraudulent, or misleading information, and one-third of all 
spam contained a fraudulent return e-mail address that was included in 
the routing information, or header, of the e-mail message.[Footnote 64] 

Section 4 of the CAN-SPAM Act criminalized five types of activities in 
connection with e-mail, set forth the maximum penalties for each type, 
and called for the U.S. Sentencing Commission to consider new 
sentencing guidelines.[Footnote 65] Specifically, the five types of 
activities are as follows: 

* accessing a protected computer without authorization to send multiple 
commercial e-mail messages, 

* using open relays with intent to deceive in sending multiple 
commercial e-mail messages, 

* using materially false header information in sending commercial e- 
mail messages, 

* falsely registering e-mail accounts or domain names in connection 
with sending multiple commercial e-mail messages, and: 

* falsely claiming to be the registrant of Internet protocol addresses 
for sending spam.[Footnote 66] 

The criminal penalties fall into three tiers. First, a 5-year statutory 
maximum applies when the CAN-SPAM violation is in furtherance of any 
felony under state or federal law, or when the defendant has previously 
been convicted of an offense under 18 U.S.C. § 1037.[Footnote 67] 
Second, a 3-year maximum applies for convictions of hacking into a 
computer, or to use a computer system that the owner has made available 
for other purposes, as a conduit for bulk commercial e-mail or for 
other violations of 18 U.S.C. § 1037 (a) when one of several additional 
conditions apply. The conditions relate to the measure of the economic 
gain or loss, the volume of e-mail sent, the number of false 
registrations used, or whether the defendant had a leadership role in 
the offense. Finally, a 1-year statutory maximum applies for any other 
violation of 18 U.S.C. § 1037. In addition, 18 U.S.C. § 1037(c) allows 
DOJ to seek the criminal forfeiture of both property obtained from 
spamming profits and the computers used to send the spam. In December 
2005, FTC reported to Congress that DOJ had brought four criminal 
prosecutions under the CAN-SPAM Act, and that numerous other nonpublic 
investigations were ongoing.[Footnote 68] 

Lastly, the CAN-SPAM Act supplements some consumer protections that 
were already established by TCPA for regulating unwanted text messages 
and e-mail on mobile devices. Together, the two laws impose limitations 
on both unsolicited telephone marketing calls and any other calls to a 
paging service, cellular telephone service, other radio common carrier 
service, or any service for which the person being called would be 
charged for the call. Under TCPA rules, a "call" includes text 
messaging if the messaging is sent to a telephone number rather than an 
e-mail account. Electronic messages can be sent to mobile devices using 
a variety of methods. The type of technology used to send the 
electronic message determines how the electronic message is regulated. 

The CAN-SPAM Act required that FCC adopt rules to protect consumers 
from receiving unsolicited mobile service commercial messages.[Footnote 
69] Under the act, a mobile service commercial message is a commercial 
e-mail message that is transmitted directly to a wireless device that 
is utilized by a subscriber of commercial mobile service in connection 
with that service. The act defines an e-mail message as a message 
having a unique e-mail address that includes a reference to an Internet 
domain. FCC issued rules in August 2004. 

FCC adopted a general prohibition on sending commercial messages to any 
address referencing an Internet domain name associated with wireless 
subscriber message services. To assist the senders of such messages in 
identifying those subscribers, FCC requires commercial radio service 
providers to submit those names to the commission, for inclusion on a 
public list. FCC pursues violations of both CAN-SPAM and TCPA as it 
relates to wireless devices under its general enforcement authority. 

As part of our study, we considered whether additional enforcement 
measures might be necessary to protect consumers from junk faxes, and 
whether establishing junk fax penalties and enforcement actions for 
repeat violators or abusive violations similar to the criminal 
penalties under CAN-SPAM would have a greater deterrent effect. As 
explained in the letter of this report, without FCC establishing 
performance goals and measures and analyzing complaint and enforcement 
data, it is not possible to explore the effectiveness of current 
enforcement measures. Without first gaining an understanding of the 
effectiveness of current enforcement measures, it is similarly not 
possible to determine whether additional enforcement measures are 
necessary to protect consumers. We did, however, ask federal government 
officials, representatives of the state attorneys general, consumer 
advocates, and business associations for their opinions regarding 
whether additional enforcement measures are currently necessary to 
enforce junk fax violations. Those with whom we spoke generally did not 
believe that additional measures were necessary at this time and did 
not support imposing criminal sanctions on junk fax violators similar 
to those imposed on spammers under CAN-SPAM.[Footnote 70] A few of 
those with whom we spoke thought that the role of the telephone 
companies might be expanded, similar to the role of ISPs under the CAN- 
SPAM Act, so that telephone companies could bring suit against junk 
faxers using their networks. 

[End of section] 

Appendix II: Scope and Methodology: 

The Junk Fax Prevention Act of 2005 required GAO to report to Congress 
on FCC's enforcement of the junk fax laws. Accordingly, we answered the 
following questions: (1) What procedures have FCC established for 
taking action on junk fax complaints--including receipt, 
acknowledgment, investigation, and enforcement--and to what extent has 
it taken such action? (2) What are the strengths and weaknesses of 
FCC's junk fax procedures? and (3) What challenges do FCC face in 
carrying out its junk fax responsibilities? 

To determine FCC's procedures for taking action on junk fax complaints, 
we reviewed provisions of TCPA as well as FCC's rules and procedures 
for implementing the provisions of the act. We interviewed officials 
from FCC's Consumer & Governmental Affairs Bureau (CGB)--whose 
responsibilities include developing FCC rules and accepting and 
acknowledging complaints--and FCC's Enforcement Bureau--whose 
responsibilities include junk fax enforcement. Additionally, we 
reviewed FCC's guidance to complainants for submitting junk fax 
complaints as well as FCC's procedures for receiving and documenting 
these complaints. Finally, we obtained and reviewed FCC's procedures 
for determining which complaints would receive further investigative 
and enforcement actions. 

To determine the extent to which FCC has taken action on junk fax 
complaints, we obtained and analyzed FCC's database for documenting 
junk fax complaints and the spreadsheet used for determining 
investigatory and enforcement actions. We obtained summary data on the 
number of complaints received from 2000 through 2005, by source and 
method. We also obtained detailed information on the amount of formal 
enforcement actions taken against junk faxers since the formation of 
FCC's Enforcement Bureau. Further, to determine the type of concerns 
expressed by consumers and businesses, we reviewed some individual 
consumer and business comments submitted to FCC as part of the junk fax 
complaints and contained in FCC's database. 

To assess the reliability of FCC's complaint data, we interviewed FCC 
officials responsible for the database regarding data entry and control 
procedures and reviewed existing documentation about the system. We 
conducted limited electronic tests on 2005 data to determine missing 
data and duplicative complaint identification numbers; these tests 
revealed only minor problems. We also conducted manual reviews to 
identify any discrepancies in the database. For example, we reviewed a 
portion of the comment fields in the database and found that some 
complaints that were coded as junk fax complaints should not have been. 
Since this type of review requires reading the comments for each 
complaint entered, which is resource-intensive, we did not review all 
of the comments to determine the extent of this problem. CGB officials 
acknowledged limitations of the data, including reliability problems in 
previous years of tracking complaint information, possible inaccuracies 
in coding, and continual changes to more recent data as additional 
complaints are added. We determined that the data were sufficiently 
reliable to present overall trends and approximate figures. 
Specifically, we report only overall complaint numbers for 2000 through 
2002, and approximate numbers at a more detailed level for complaints 
from 2003 through 2005. 

To determine the strengths and weaknesses of FCC's junk fax procedures, 
we analyzed these procedures, including those used to determine which 
junk fax complaints would be considered for further investigatory and 
enforcement actions. In addition, we reviewed business and consumer 
comments submitted to FCC during junk fax rulemaking and 
reconsideration of existing rules. We also analyzed all junk fax 
consumer complaint guidance provided by FCC to determine if the 
guidance was consistent with the enforcement procedures. 

To determine the challenges FCC faces in carrying out its junk fax 
responsibilities, we reviewed provisions of the Government Performance 
and Results Act of 1993, as well as documents and records used by FCC 
to establish goals and performance measures--that is, budget 
justifications, performance summaries, and strategic plans. We also 
reviewed FCC's quarterly complaint reports to determine the level of 
analysis being conducted on junk fax complaints. 

Finally, we used existing statutes and regulations to provide 
information on additional enforcement measures and penalties that have 
been established to protect consumers from other types of unsolicited 
advertising. We interviewed FTC staff, representatives from the 
National Association of Attorney's General, and representatives from 
industry groups to obtain more information on different enforcement 
rules and actions. 

We conducted our work from November 2005 through March 2006 in 
accordance with generally accepted government auditing standards. 

[End of section] 

Appendix III: Consumer Complaints Reported to FCC: 

Table 3: Number of Complaints Reported Publicly by FCC, by Type, 2003-
2005: 

Type of complaints: Cable and satellite services: Billing and rates; 
Complaints, by calendar year: 2005: 290; 
Complaints, by calendar year: 2004: 289; 
Complaints, by calendar year: 2003: 256. 

Type of complaints: Cable and satellite services: Cable modem services; 
Complaints, by calendar year: 2005: 148; 
Complaints, by calendar year: 2004: 93; 
Complaints, by calendar year: 2003: 113. 

Type of complaints: Cable and satellite services: Connections to cable 
TV system; 
Complaints, by calendar year: 2005: 0; 
Complaints, by calendar year: 2004: 0; 
Complaints, by calendar year: 2003: 0. 

Type of complaints: Cable and satellite services: Satellite home viewer 
improvement act; 
Complaints, by calendar year: 2005: 0; 
Complaints, by calendar year: 2004: 0; 
Complaints, by calendar year: 2003: 0. 

Type of complaints: Cable and satellite services: Accessibility issues; 
Complaints, by calendar year: 2005: 75; 
Complaints, by calendar year: 2004: 63; 
Complaints, by calendar year: 2003: 88. 

Type of complaints: Cable and satellite services: Programming issues; 
Complaints, by calendar year: 2005: 600; 
Complaints, by calendar year: 2004: 152; 
Complaints, by calendar year: 2003: 137. 

Type of complaints: Cable and satellite services: Service-related 
issues; 
Complaints, by calendar year: 2005: 264; 
Complaints, by calendar year: 2004: 145; 
Complaints, by calendar year: 2003: 425. 

Type of complaints: Radio and television broadcasting: Accessibility 
issues; 
Complaints, by calendar year: 2005: 86; 
Complaints, by calendar year: 2004: 102; 
Complaints, by calendar year: 2003: 337. 

Type of complaints: Radio and television broadcasting: Loud commercial; 
Complaints, by calendar year: 2005: 0; 
Complaints, by calendar year: 2004: 0; 
Complaints, by calendar year: 2003: 24. 

Type of complaints: Radio and television broadcasting: Howard Stern 
commentary; 
Complaints, by calendar year: 2005: 0; 
Complaints, by calendar year: 2004: 20; 
Complaints, by calendar year: 2003: 0. 

Type of complaints: Radio and television broadcasting: Programming - 
general criticism; 
Complaints, by calendar year: 2005: 1,071; 
Complaints, by calendar year: 2004: 615; 
Complaints, by calendar year: 2003: 351. 

Type of complaints: Radio and television broadcasting: Programming - 
indecency/obscenity; 
Complaints, by calendar year: 2005: 233,471; 
Complaints, by calendar year: 2004: 1,405,419; 
Complaints, by calendar year: 2003: 166,683. 

Type of complaints: Radio and television broadcasting: Programming - 
religious; 
Complaints, by calendar year: 2005: 0; 
Complaints, by calendar year: 2004: 0; 
Complaints, by calendar year: 2003: 4. 

Type of complaints: Radio and television broadcasting: Other 
programming issues; 
Complaints, by calendar year: 2005: 106; 
Complaints, by calendar year: 2004: 136; 
Complaints, by calendar year: 2003: 260. 

Type of complaints: Wireless telecommunications: Billing and rates; 
Complaints, by calendar year: 2005: 13,065; 
Complaints, by calendar year: 2004: 14,546; 
Complaints, by calendar year: 2003: 10,592. 

Type of complaints: Wireless telecommunications: Carrier marketing and 
advertising; 
Complaints, by calendar year: 2005: 3,080; 
Complaints, by calendar year: 2004: 3,104; 
Complaints, by calendar year: 2003: 2,133. 

Type of complaints: Wireless telecommunications: Contract - early 
termination; 
Complaints, by calendar year: 2005: 3,956; 
Complaints, by calendar year: 2004: 3,958; 
Complaints, by calendar year: 2003: 2,386. 

Type of complaints: Wireless telecommunications: Cramming; 
Complaints, by calendar year: 2005: 0; 
Complaints, by calendar year: 2004: 0; 
Complaints, by calendar year: 2003: 0. 

Type of complaints: Wireless telecommunications: Number portability; 
Complaints, by calendar year: 2005: 0; 
Complaints, by calendar year: 2004: 4,839; 
Complaints, by calendar year: 2003: 3,447. 

Type of complaints: Wireless telecommunications: Equipment; 
Complaints, by calendar year: 2005: 1,832; 
Complaints, by calendar year: 2004: 0; 
Complaints, by calendar year: 2003: 633. 

Type of complaints: Wireless telecommunications: Service quality; 
Complaints, by calendar year: 2005: 4,009; 
Complaints, by calendar year: 2004: 3,031; 
Complaints, by calendar year: 2003: 2,166. 

Type of complaints: Wireline telecommunications: Billing and rates; 
Complaints, by calendar year: 2005: 13,562; 
Complaints, by calendar year: 2004: 14,775; 
Complaints, by calendar year: 2003: 17,956. 

Type of complaints: Wireline telecommunications: Carrier marketing and 
advertising; 
Complaints, by calendar year: 2005: 433; 
Complaints, by calendar year: 2004: 1,952; 
Complaints, by calendar year: 2003: 2,834. 

Type of complaints: Wireline telecommunications: Cramming; 
Complaints, by calendar year: 2005: 1,761; 
Complaints, by calendar year: 2004: 526; 
Complaints, by calendar year: 2003: 2,450. 

Type of complaints: Wireline telecommunications: Service quality; 
Complaints, by calendar year: 2005: 2,093; 
Complaints, by calendar year: 2004: 1,487; 
Complaints, by calendar year: 2003: 470. 

Type of complaints: Wireline telecommunications: Slamming; 
Complaints, by calendar year: 2005: 1,932; 
Complaints, by calendar year: 2004: 4,535; 
Complaints, by calendar year: 2003: 6,052. 

Type of complaints: Wireline telecommunications: Telephone Consumer 
Protection Act; 
Complaints, by calendar year: 2005: 54,932; 
Complaints, by calendar year: 2004: 37,702; 
Complaints, by calendar year: 2003: 25,674. 

Source: FCC. 

[End of table] 

Figure 5: Percentage of TCPA Complaints Reported in FCC Quarterly 
Reports That Are Junk Fax Complaints, 2003-2005: 

[See PDF for image] 

[End of figure] 

[End of section] 

(543153): 

FOOTNOTES 

[1] Pub. L. No. 102-243, § 3(a), 105 Stat. 2394, 2395 (1991). 

[2] Pub. L. No. 109-21, 119 Stat. 359 (2005). 

[3] In particular, because of concerns over some missing data and data 
counting errors, we report only overall complaint numbers for 2000 
through 2002, and approximate numbers at a more detailed level for 
complaints from 2003 through 2005. 

[4] As amended, the term "unsolicited advertisement" means "any 
material advertising the commercial availability or quality of any 
property, goals, or services which is transmitted to any person without 
that person's prior express invitation or permission in writing or 
otherwise." 47 U.S.C. § 227(a)(4). 

[5] The enforcement mechanisms apply to TCPA violations, which include 
sending an unsolicited advertisement to a fax machine. 

[6] 47 U.S.C. § 227(b)(3). 

[7] 47 U.S.C. § 227(f). 

[8] 47 U.S.C. § 503. 

[9] Although TCPA provided for an EBR exception for telephone 
solicitations, the act was silent with respect to fax solicitations. 
See, Rules and Regulations Implementing the Telephone Consumer 
Protection Act of 1991, CC Docket No. 92-90, Report and Order, 7 FCC 
Rcd. 8752, 8779, para. 54 n. 87 (1992) (1992 TCPA Order). 

[10] See, Rules and Regulations Implementing the Telephone Consumer 
Protection Act of 1991; Junk Fax Protection Act of 2005, CG Docket No. 
02-278, CG Docket No. 05-358, Notice of Proposed Rulemaking and Order, 
2005 FCC 05-206, para. 3 (2005) (ref. Dec. 9, 2005) (Junk Fax NPRM). 

[11] Junk Fax NPRM at para. 32. 

[12] FCC was required to implement the amendments by April 5, 2006. FCC 
released its Junk Fax NPRM on December 9, 2005. 

[13] We were told by CGB officials that FCC's consumer centers 
responded to over 3 million calls in 2005. 

[14] The remaining three types of TCPA violations are using artificial 
or prerecorded voice messages; using a telemarketer's automatic dialer 
to simultaneously dial more numbers than the telemarketer can handle; 
and initiating a call for the purpose of encouraging the purchase or 
rental of, or investment in, property, goods, or services. 

[15] Junk fax enforcement is only one part of the division's 
responsibilities, which includes resolving other TCPA-related 
complaints as well as disability and slamming complaints. TCPA-related 
complaints include reports of telephone solicitations after 9 p.m. and 
before 8 a.m. or requests to be removed from telephone solicitations 
not being honored. 

[16] The citation is released publicly, posted on the commission's Web 
site, and listed in the commission's Daily Digest. The citation gives 
the faxer a reasonable opportunity (usually 30 days) to request a 
personal interview with a commission official at the FCC field office 
nearest to the faxer's place of residence. 47 U.S.C. § 503(b)(5). 

[17] If the alleged violator holds or has applied for a commission 
authorization or license (e.g., telephone companies or radio stations), 
the commission may initiate an investigation that may lead to the 
issuance of a forfeiture order without issuing a citation first. 

[18] The "private right of action" states that an individual may go to 
court and seek damages for up to $500 for every unsolicited fax 
advertisement received. FCC staff said that they were not aware of any 
source that comprehensively tracks or documents such lawsuits. 

[19] In 2005, for example, there were about four times as many consumer 
complaints about indecency and obscenity as there were about junk 
faxes. 

[20] FCC rules prohibit telephone solicitation calls to residential 
homes after 9 p.m. and before 8 a.m. In March 2006, FCC revised its 
consumer call center script to advise callers that these restrictions 
do not apply when an otherwise legal fax (e.g., when an EBR exists 
between the faxer and the recipient) is sent. In other words, if a 
consumer receives a fax at 2 a.m. from someone with whom there is an 
EBR, there is no violation. 

[21] Inclusion of an opt-out telephone number on the faxed 
advertisement was required by Congress in the 2005 Act and is to be 
implemented into FCC's rules by April 5, 2006. Previously, some faxers 
were already including an opt-out number on their faxes. TCPA requires 
that identifying information be placed on all fax transmissions. 

[22] "Pump-and-dump" schemes, also known as "hype-and-dump 
manipulation," involve the touting of a company's stock through false 
and misleading statements to the marketplace. After "pumping" the stock 
to inflate the prices, those involved will then sell, or "dump," their 
stock into the market at a profit. 

[23] If complainants send copies of the associated faxes by postal mail 
or e-mail, CGB staff scan the copies into the complaint database. 
However, if the complainant sends in more than 10 pages of faxes, CGB 
staff do not scan all of this information into the database because of 
the amount of time required to scan the documents and the amount of 
space required in the database. According to FCC officials, beginning 
on May 1, 2006, all faxes will be received by Right Fax, which is a 
personal computer-based fax software that will eliminate the need for 
CGB staff to scan faxes into the database. 

[24] EB staff began using this spreadsheet in July 2005. Previously, 
analysts sorted faxes by hand. 

[25] EB staff also sort the opt-out numbers to identify major fax 
broadcasters. Fax broadcasters send out, for a fee, fax advertisements 
and notices for other businesses and individuals. 

[26] EB officials also stated that citations are relatively easy to 
issue. Citations may not require a copy of the associated fax, and 
there is no time limit on issuing a citation. 

[27] According to EB officials, the number of citations increased in 
2002 because of the activities of one fax broadcaster, Fax.Com, Inc. Of 
the 120 citations issued in 2002, 104 were associated with this fax 
broadcaster. 

[28] Before initiating forfeiture, EB staff contact complainants and 
obtain signed declarations that attest, under penalty of perjury, to 
the apparently unlawful junk faxes and to whether the complainant 
granted permission to, or had an EBR with, the faxer. 

[29] 47 C.F.R. § 1.80(c)(3),(f). 

[30] The recipient can file a petition for reconsideration or an 
application for review, prompting the commission or EB to issue an 
order addressing the recipient's arguments and deciding whether to 
uphold, reduce, or rescind the forfeiture amount. 

[31] The matter is referred to DOJ after it has become final and the 
order is no longer an appealable order or after the appropriate court 
has entered final judgment in favor of FCC. 

[32] EB officials stated they are currently working with DOJ to collect 
the $5,379,000 forfeiture against Fax.Com, Inc. 

[33] CGB officials have revised the Internet complaint form several 
times; the most recent revision was in November 2005. While previous 
versions of the form made it easy for complainants to identify the type 
of TCPA violation, the most recent version does not. 

[34] In addition, CGB staff may not enter any of the information 
contained in a copy of an alleged junk fax submitted by a complainant 
because the fax has been scanned and attached to the database. 

[35] The database does include separate fields for the date the 
complaint was received; the name, address, and telephone number of the 
complainant; and the method by which the complaint was sent to FCC. 

[36] CGB officials said they are currently working on follow-up 
procedures for junk fax complaints, but they could not provide any 
information on what these procedures would cover or when they would be 
completed. 

[37] CGB officials said they generally do not maintain complaint data 
that are over 2 years old, but they were able to provide total junk fax 
complaint numbers as far back as 2000. 

[38] Enforcement analysts cannot determine from the consumer database 
if an attachment to a complaint record is the associated fax, a copy of 
the complaint letter, or a copy of the Internet complaint form. 
Therefore, analysts have to open each attachment, and if it is the 
associated fax, they transfer the information to the enforcement 
spreadsheet. It if is not, they skip the complaint and move on to the 
next record. 

[39] Some of these complainants that used an Internet complaint form 
may have separately mailed, faxed, or e-mailed a copy of the 
unsolicited fax associated with their complaint to the commission. In 
these cases, CGB staff may have counted the submission as a new 
complaint in the database if the complainant had not included the 
original FCC-assigned complaint number. 

[40] Consumer and enforcement officials said they currently do not 
search CGB's complaint database for the names or telephone numbers of 
businesses or consumers that previously received junk fax citations. In 
addition, CGB officials said they could not flag this information in 
complaints being entered into CGB's database to help identify repeat 
violators. 

[41] Pub. L. No. 103-62, 107 Stat. 285 (1993). 

[42] For additional details on GPRA and its requirements, see GAO, 
Results Oriented Government: GPRA Has Established a Solid Foundation 
for Achieving Greater Results, GAO-04-38 (Washington, D.C.: Mar. 10, 
2004). 

[43] See the Background section of this report for descriptions of all 
six TCPA-related violations. 

[44] In March 2006, FCC revised its consumer call center script to 
advise callers that fax senders are not obligated to access the 
National Do-Not-Call Registry and "scrub" their fax number lists. 
However, other consumer guidance, including FCC's junk fax "Fact 
Sheet," has not yet been revised. 

[45] Pub. L. No. 102-243, 105 Stat. 2394 (1991) (to be codified at 47 
U.S.C. § 227). 

[46] Pub. L. No. 103-297, 108 Stat. 1545 (1994) (codified at 15 U.S.C. 
§§ 6101 et seq.) 

[47] Pub. L. No. 108-187, 117 Stat. 2699 (2003) (codified at 15 U.S.C. 
§§ 7701 et seq.) 

[48] Pub. L. No. 108-187, § 14 (2003) (codified at 15 U.S.C. § 7712). 

[49] 15 U.S.C. § 6102(a)(3)(A). 

[50] 16 C.F.R. § 310. 

[51] Certain entities, including banks, credit unions, savings and 
loans, common carriers engaged in common carrier activities, nonprofit 
organizations, and companies engaged in the business of insurance 
regulated by state law, are not covered by TSR because they are 
specifically exempt from coverage under the Federal Trade Commission 
Act. 15 U.S.C. § 45(a)(2). A number of entities, and individuals 
associated with them, that sell investments and are subject to the 
jurisdiction of the Securities and Exchange Commission or the Commodity 
Futures Trading Commission are exempt from TSR. 15 U.S.C. § 
6102(d)(2)(A); 6102(e)(1). 

[52] 15 U.S.C. § 57a. 

[53] 15 U.S.C. § 6103. 

[54] 15 U.S.C. § 6104. 

[55] Pub. L. No. 108-10, 117 Stat. 557 (2003). 

[56] Pub. L. No. 108-82, 117 Stat. 1006 (2003). The United States Court 
of Appeals for the 10TH Circuit also ruled that, on the basis of FTC's 
existing statutory responsibilities prior to the September 2003 
legislation, FTC had the authority to create the national registry. 
Mainstream Marketing Services, Inc. v. FTC, 358 F.3d 1228 (10TH Cir. 
2004), cert. denied 543 US 812 (2004). 

[57] Once a number is registered on the National Do-Not-Call Registry, 
telemarketers have up to 31 days (starting Jan. 1, 2005) to stop 
calling that number. 

[58] Consumers can sign up for the National Do-Not-Call Registry at 
www.donotcall.gov. 

[59] Pub. L. No. 108-187, 117 Stat. 2699 (2003) (codified at 15 U.S.C. 
7701 et seq., 18 U.S.C. § 1037, and 28 U.S.C. § 994). 

[60] 15 U.S.C. § 7707 (b). 

[61] The maximum per-violation statutory damage figures are $250 for 
state attorneys general and $100 for ISPs. 

[62] Federal Trade Commission Report, Effectiveness and Enforcement of 
the CAN-SPAM Act: A Report to Congress (December 2005) (FTC CAN-SPAM 
Report). 

[63] In addition to FTC and DOJ, federal entities with enforcement 
authority under the act are FCC, the Office of the Comptroller of the 
Currency, the Federal Reserve Board, the Federal Deposit Insurance 
Commission, the Office of Thrift Supervision, the National Credit Union 
Administration, the Security and Exchange Commission, the Department of 
Transportation, the Department of Agriculture, and the Farm Credit 
Administration. 15 U.S.C. § 7706(b). 

[64] 149 Cong. Rec. S13028, 13029 (daily ed. June 18, 2002) (statement 
of Sen. Hatch). 

[65] The Sentencing Guideline revisions applicable on November 1, 2004, 
implement the relevant CAN-SPAM provisions. 

[66] 18 U.S.C. § 1037(a)(1)-(5). 15 U.S.C § 7704(d) contains the only 
other criminal provisions in the CAN-SPAM Act, providing up to 5 years 
in prison for unlawful transmission of sexually oriented spam. 

[67] A prior conviction under 18 U.S.C. § 1030--a similar criminal 
section concerning fraud and related activity in connection with 
computers--may also lead to the 5-year statutory maximum. 18 U.S.C. § 
1037(b)(1)(B). 

[68] FTC CAN-SPAM Report, p. A-2. 

[69] 15 U.S.C. § 7712(b). 

[70] One consumer advocate noted that criminal penalties could be 
beneficial, but that the real issue was enforcement of the junk fax 
rules. 

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