porn

My recent post, Paying for Porn, notes that the FCC is looking into an alleged scam in which rural phone carriers are collecting huge federal universal service fees for connecting long-distance calls to “adult” chat lines. Ever wonder which companies are alleged to have done this? Here’s a list, complete with map, from The DesMoines Register. AT&T and Qwest have filed suit against them. Telephone companies sued: Lawsuits filed separately by Qwest and AT&T allege seven Iowa companies have illegally collected fees. Copyright (c) 2007, The Des Moines Register.

The Federal Communications Commission is looking into a scam involving the attempt by local phone carriers in rural areas to collect more access fees from the major long-distance providers by increasing the number of calls from “adult” chat lines. Rural carriers have long received fees (up to 5 cents per minute) from long-distance carriers for every call they connect. The original intent behind this, of course, was to ensure that rural citizens have (subsidized) phone access. So when you make a call from New York City to your grandparents in North Dakota, Verizon pays an access fee to your grandparents’ local carrier for the connection. And the smaller you grandparents’ local carrier is, the higher the per-minute fee it gets Read More ›