By Anne Cullen

Law360 (May 20, 2020, 8:36 PM EDT) -- The U.S. government has shot off a second wave of warning letters to telecoms routing coronavirus-related phone scams into the country after federal regulators successfully put a stop to similar bogus calling campaigns last month.

The Federal Trade Commission and the Federal Communications Commission told two U.S. telecoms and one Canadian provider on Wednesday that if they didn't cut off this traffic within 48 hours, they could be blocked from routing any calls into U.S. networks and potentially face legal action.

"They need to stop this traffic and not let it back on their networks — or face losing their access to the American phone system," FCC Chairman Ajit Pai said in a statement.

FTC Chairman Joe Simons added that robocalls are "especially abhorrent when scammers exploit pandemic-related anxiety."

The scams included robocalls touting fake COVID-19 refunds, coronavirus-related loan rate reduction opportunities and one claiming to be from the Social Security Administration citing issues with the consumer's account due to the pandemic, according to the agencies.

California-based communications provider IntelePeer Cloud Communications LLC, which the agencies blamed for routing loan rate reduction scams, said Wednesday it "has zero tolerance for companies participating in unlawful robocalls" and has "shut down offending customers immediately."

"We have, and will continue to work with the FCC and USTelecom to combat illegal robocalling and malicious spoofing to help protect consumers," IntelePeer's Alison Haynes told Law360 in an email.

A so-called "traceback" group managed by prominent trade association USTelecom assisted the agencies in the effort to track down the networks carrying the scam calls.

While the FCC and FTC said IntelePeer had been uncooperative with parts of the investigation, reportedly refusing to identify the client behind the scam routed through IntelePeer's network, Haynes said that doesn't appear to be accurate.

"IntelePeer has responded fully to the FCC on illegal robocalling activity, including providing the name of the offending customer," she said.

Another telecom the agencies called out Wednesday, Ontario-headquartered RSCom LTD, told Law360 that its infraction — a robocall touting bogus COVID-19 refunds — was carried out by a customer that the telecom blocked within 20 minutes of receiving the federal regulators' letter. That customer appears to be U.K. provider Voice Are Us Ltd., according to the letter sent to RSCom.

"We are committed to eliminating fraud from the network and we work in close contact with FCC, USTelecom and any other authorized agency, helping them isolate and block those customers," RSCom managing director Vitaly Potapov said in an email. Potapov also emphasized that RSCom is a middle carrier, meaning the provider doesn't generate calls of its own. "All of our calls come from our customers," Potapov said.

A representative for the third telecom warned Wednesday, D.C.-based PTGi International Carrier Services Inc., did not respond to a request for comment. Voice Are Us also did not respond to a request for comment.

The agencies' latest warnings come in the wake of a successful campaign against virus-related scam calls that the regulators carried out in April. All three providers on the receiving end of the first wave of warning letters — SIPJoin, Connexum and BLMarketing — cut off the offending traffic within a day, according to Wednesday's announcement.

However, regulators said those companies are still on their radar. "The FCC and its traceback partners continue to monitor all those providers should they again allow such traffic," the agencies said.

--Additional reporting by Nadia Dreid. Editing by Kelly Duncan.

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