Attorney General Aaron M. Frey in a TV Appearance Earlier This Year.
Late last week AG Aaron W. Frey announced Phase 2 of Operation Robocall Roundup, expanding the crackdown on illegal robocalls to include four of the largest voice providers in the country. As part of the ongoing operation, the bipartisan Anti-Robocall Multistate Litigation Task Force has directed Inteliquent, Bandwidth, Lumen and Peerless to stop transmitting suspected illegal robocalls across their networks.
“Robocalls contiue to be one of the most common ways that scammers reach out to Mainers,” said Attorney General Frey. “While many of the actors themselves are beyond the reach of Maine or US law, my colleagues and I are requiring companies to take responsibility for the calls they are allowing through their networks.”
In August, AG Frey sent warning letters to 37 smaller voice providers that were allowing suspecdted illegal robocalls onto the US telephone network. This next phase targets comapnies with far larger footprints in the US telecom ecosystem. The four companies are contdinuing to transmit hundreds of thousands — and in some cases, millions — of suspected illegal robocalls.
As larger providers, these companies have a heightened responsiility to decline call traffic from known and repeat bad actors. Despite extensive industry traceback notices and years of documented warnings, these four providers continue to route suspected illegal robocalls onto the network and into American homes.
After sending warning letters to 37 companies in Phase 1, the Task Force saw rapid, measurable changes:
13 companies were removed from the FCC’s Robocall Mitigation Database, meaning no provider in the US may accept their call traffic; 19 companies stopped appearing in any traceback results; indicating they ceased routing suspected illegal robocalls; and at least four providers terminated high-risk customer accounts identified as transmitting illegal traffic.
In 2023, 51 attorneys general joined forces to create the Anti-Robocall Litigation Task Force which is led by North Carollina AG Jeff Jackson, Indiana AG Todd Rokita and Ohio AG Dave Yost. The Task Force investigates and takes legal action against companies responsible for significant volumes of illegal and farudulent robocall traffic routed into and across the US.
Please vist post herein dated August 7, 2025 for background information on the investigation by the Task Force.