Verizon Wireless files suit in phone spam case

NEW YORK (Reuters) – Verizon Wireless said on Wednesday it
has filed a lawsuit seeking an injunction against a Florida
firm that it charges with sending thousands of unsolicited text
messages to Verizon customers’ mobile phones.

The wireless venture of Verizon Communications Inc. and
Vodafone Group Plc said it filed the suit in U.S. District
Court in New Jersey after 98,000 spam messages were sent on
behalf of Ormond Beach, Florida, firm Passport Holidays telling
Verizon customers they had won cruises to the Bahamas.

While there have been relatively few cases of illegal
spamming to mobile phones in the U.S., all of U.S. wireless
operators are being more vigilant about such incidents, which
could cost users and carriers dearly, said Ovum analyst Roger
Entner.

Verizon Wireless, which has already filed several
privacy-related lawsuits this year, accused Passport of
illegally using automatic dialing equipment to send large
numbers of spam text messages to sequential phone numbers in a
short space of time.

The No. 2 U.S. mobile service, which had 49.3 million
customers at the end of the third quarter, said the defendants,
which also include “currently unknown individuals,” had also
tried to avoid Verizon’s spam filters and hide their
identities.

About a quarter of the messages appeared to have been sent
automatically to customers with sequential phone numbers,
Verizon Wireless spokesman Tom Pica said.

But Verizon is still trying to find out how the other phone
numbers were exposed.

“One of the reasons we file these suits is not only to stop
these people but to find out how they do it,” said Pica, who
added that the company is also looking at other cases
concerning customer privacy.

Entner said wireless operators need to be even more careful
than Internet service providers because the stakes are higher.

“While it is very annoying to get spam in your e-mail
account, it doesn’t cost you anything, whereas on a wireless
phone it costs you up to 10 cents a message,” Entner said.

Even if Verizon received messaging fees from each of the
98,000 customers who was spammed, it could have lost anywhere
between $500,000 and $1 million if each one had called customer
service to complain, said Entner, who assumes such calls cost
the company between $5 and $8 on average.

Entner said that such cases are minimized because virtually
every U.S. state has anti-spam laws.

“In the few cases where somebody is stupid enough to do it,
at least the carriers are stepping up to the plate,” he said.