Attorney General Josh Stein Announces Lawsuit Against Illegal Robocallers

For Immediate Release:
Friday, October 18, 2024

Contact:
Nazneen Ahmed (919) 716-0060

(RALEIGH) Attorney General Josh Stein today announced legal actions to protect North Carolinians from illegal robocalls that destroy their peace of mind and scam them out of hard-earned money.

Attorney General Stein is suing Club Exploria, LLC, a timeshare company also known as Exploria Resorts, for unlawfully spamming more than one million North Carolinians with robocalls trying to sell timeshares and vacation rentals. In North Carolina, businesses that solicit customers by telephone must get people's consent before robocalling them. Club Exploria allegedly failed to get this consent before placing these million-plus robocalls to North Carolinians.

"Club Exploria broke the law to bombard North Carolinians with robocalls," said Attorney General Josh Stein. "That's unacceptable, and I won't tolerate robocallers breaking the law and taking North Carolinians' hard-earned money."

The Attorney General's Office received almost a dozen complaints about Club Exploria's business practices. Attorney General Stein is asking the court to ban Club Exploria from making robocalls to North Carolinians and require Club Exploria to pay additional penalties. A copy of the complaint is available here. Attorney General Stein has also issued two civil investigative demands into companies possibly making illegal robocalls and robotexts.

Additionally, Attorney General Stein is asking the court to rule against Articul8 in his lawsuit against the phone company for violating telemarking laws and routing more than 65 million calls to phone numbers in North Carolina. Many of the calls Articul8 routed to North Carolinians were from imposter scammers pretending to be from the Social Security Administration, the FBI, and state and local police departments. Attorney General Stein's lawsuit against Articul8 already led to the owner and operator exiting the robocall business - now, Attorney General Stein is asking the court to end Articul8 and this lawsuit.

"Articul8 and its owner looked the other way and allowed illegal robocalls onto our network where they confused and scared North Carolinians," said Attorney General Josh Stein. "I'm pleased that we have put the owner out of business, and I'm asking the court to help us finish this case by shutting down Articul8."

In his role leading the Anti-Robocall Multistate Litigation Task Force, Attorney General Stein and 50 other attorneys general also issued a warning letter to iDentidad to stop transmitting illegal robocall traffic on behalf of its clients. iDentidad has received more than 190 traceback notices warning of unlawful or suspicious robocalls that it helped move into and through the U.S. telephone network. In coordination, the FCC today also issued a cease-and-desist notice to iDentidad. If iDentidad continues to transmit illegal robocalls, the task force may pursue further legal actions against the company and its owners. A copy of the task force's letter is available here, and other warning letters the task force has sent are available here.

Robocalls have been the top complaint to the North Carolina Department of Justice each year of the two terms Attorney General Stein has been in office. He has prioritized fighting back to stop them throughout his time as attorney general, and is taking these actions today to signal to both robocall providers and companies that that we will use the tools at our disposal to stop this predatory and often illegal behavior.

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