Fax.com agreed to a court injunction banning it from illegally sending unsolicited faxes to consumers, the California attorney general's office said Friday.
Under the agreement, filed Oct. 5 in U.S. District Court in San Diego, Fax.com, Aliso Viejo, CA, must abide by numerous business practice guidelines including consent, disclosure and representation rules and an order to cease automatically dialing numbers for the sole purpose of determining whether they are fax or voice lines.
The order will remain in effect while California attorney general Bill Lockyer pursues a civil case against Fax.com that alleges violations of the Telephone Consumer Protection Act.
“The court's action ensures at least the temporary shutdown of Fax.com's illegal, around-the-clock privacy invasion operation,” said Tom Dresslar, a spokesman for the California attorney general's office. “That's welcome news for California consumers, taxpayers and businesses. They bear the brunt of the junk-fax burden, and it's their privacy, choice and pocketbooks that our lawsuit aims to protect.”
In January, the Federal Communications Commission slapped Fax.com with a $5.4 million fine. In 2002, Fax.com was the subject of a still-pending $2.2 trillion civil suit filed by Steve Kirsch, president of Propel Software and founder of Junkfax.org.
