Attorney General Mayes Begins Phase 2 of Operation Robocall Roundup, Announces Investigation of Major Service Providers Inteliquent, Bandwidth, Lumen, and Peerless

PHOENIX – Attorney General Kris Mayes 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 an ongoing investigation, the bipartisan Anti-Robocall Multistate Litigation Task Force has directed Inteliquent, Bandwidth, Lumen, and Peerless to stop transmitting suspected illegal robocalls across their networks.

"People are being bombarded with incessant—and frankly, illegal— robocalls and scam calls, and my office is doing something about it," said Attorney General Mayes. "It almost makes you not want to answer the phone anymore. These companies are transmitting hundreds of thousands, if not millions, of suspected illegal robocalls and it's absolutely unacceptable." 

In August, Attorney General Mayes sent warning letters to 37 smaller voice providers that were allowing suspected illegal robocalls onto the U.S. telephone network. This next phase targets companies with far larger footprints in the U.S. telecom ecosystem. The four companies are continuing to transmit hundreds of thousands - and in some cases, millions - of suspected illegal robocalls.
 

Scope of Suspected Illegal Robocall Activity
 

The above chart shows the scale of suspected illegal robocall activity linked to each company. The first column reflects how many traceback notices each company has received since 2019. A traceback notice is an official alert from industry investigators indicating that a company transmitted a call tied to a suspected illegal robocall campaign. The next two columns estimate the major scam categories – such as fake Amazon, Apple, Social Security, or IRS calls – that moved through each company’s network. Together, the data shows both the specific types of scams these companies helped transmit and the staggering volume of robocalls flowing across their systems.

As larger providers, these companies have a heightened responsibility 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.

Phase 1 Has Already Delivered Results

After sending warning letters to 37 companies, the Task Force saw rapid, measurable changes:

• 13 companies were removed from the FCC’s Robocall Mitigation Database, meaning no provider in the United States may accept their call traffic.
• 19 companies stopped appearing in any traceback results, indicating they ceased routing suspected illegal robocalls.
• At least four providers terminated high-risk customer accounts identified as transmitting illegal traffic.

"People know these robocalls are happening, they are dealing with it everyday, and it's our job as law enforcement to do something about it. We can't just let Arizonans continue to be targeted for fraud and scams by these illegal callers," said Attorney General Mayes. 

In 2022, 51 attorneys general joined forces to create the Anti-Robocall Litigation Task Force, which is led by North Carolina Attorney General Jeff Jackson, Indiana Attorney General Todd Rokita, and Ohio Attorney General Dave Yost. The Task Force investigates and takes legal action against companies responsible for significant volumes of illegal and fraudulent robocall traffic routed into and across the United States.

Notice letters can be found here.