Attorney General Lynn Fitch
Tired of those spam calls constantly ringing your phone? Attorney General Lynn Fitch and Attorney General’s from every state join task force to fight these calls.
This is a bipartisan nationwide effort to cut down on illegal robocalls.
So far, the task force has issued 20 civil investigative demands to 20 gateway providers and other entities that are allegedly responsible for a majority of foreign robocall traffic.
Gateway providers that bring foreign traffic into the U.S. telephone network have a responsibility to ensure the traffic is legal, but these providers are not taking sufficient action to stop robocall traffic. In many cases, they appear to be intentionally turning a blind eye in return for steady revenue.
The Task Force will focus on the bad actors throughout the telecommunications industry, to help reduce the number robocalls that Mississippians receive and benefit the companies that are following the rules.
Roughly 33 million scam robocalls are made daily in America. These calls include Social Security Administration fraud against seniors, Amazon scams against consumers, and many other scams targeting all consumers, including some of our most vulnerable citizens.
The National Consumer Law Center and Electronic Privacy Information Center estimates that $29.8 billion dollars was stolen through scam calls in 2021. Most of this scam robocall traffic originates overseas. The Task Force is focused on shutting down the providers that profit from this illegal scam traffic and refuse to take steps to otherwise mitigate these scam calls.
“As always, an informed consumer is a scammer’s worst nightmare,” continued General Fitch. “Please know the signs of a scam and be sure to report them to my office so we can take appropriate action, as well.”
Attorney General Fitch offers the following tips to avoid scams and unwanted calls:
- Be wary of callers who specifically ask you to pay by gift card, wire transfer, or cryptocurrency. For example, the Internal Revenue Service does not accept iTunes gift cards.
- Look out for prerecorded calls from imposters posing as government agencies. Typically, the Social Security Administration does not make phone calls to individuals.
- If you suspect fraudulent activity, immediately hang-up and do not provide any personal information.
- Contact our Consumer Protection Division at consumer@ago.ms.govor complete our consumer complaint form here
