Over the last decade, caller ID has become so common that most people don't even realize it's there. The days of picking up the phone without knowing who is on the other end -- or waiting for the machine to pick up as a way to screen calls -- are things of the past.
But "spoofing, a controversial practice in which callers use a device to block caller IDs from identifying their phone number, is bringing those days back for some callers. The practice is already becoming popular among fraudsters. And debate over the practice is heating up in Mississippi, and is likely to spread around the country.
A lawsuit filed last week in federal court in Mississippi is challenging that state's Anti-Spoofing Act, which makes it illegal to "enter or cause to be entered false information into a telephone caller identification system with the intent to deceive, defraud or mislead the recipient of a call. The law, which was signed by Governor Haley Barbour on March 15, provides for a fine of up to $1,000 and/or a sentence of up to one year in county jail.
The law applies to any phone call where at least one of the parties is physically in Mississippi.
Plaintiffs say the law violates Commerce Clause, First Amendment The plaintiffs, two non-Mississippi corporations, allege that the Act is unconstitutional both on its face and as applied, and seek an injunction preventing it from being enforced. The complaint alleges that the statute regulates interstate commerce, a practice that is delegated to Congress under the Commerce Clause of the U.S. Constitution.
The plaintiffs also contend that the law violates the First Amendment, since it infringes on their right "to communicate protected expression over the phone, and "to offer protected speech, including the right to do so anonymously.
The plaintiffs include Wonderland Rentals, a Michigan corporation which provides "market research, 'mystery shopping' and customer service analysis for a wide variety of business clients, services to which it says spoofing is essential; and TelTech Systems, a New Jersey corporation that offers the SpoofCard service, which "operates like a regular long distance calling card service, but also provides each customer the ability to change ... the Caller ID that is displayed on a called party's telephone.
TelTech claims that the SpoofCard has around 500,000 users nationwide.
In July 2009, a Florida court ruled a similar anti-spoofing law unconstitutional. That ruling, which grew out of another lawsuit brought by TelTech, said that the only way for consumers to ensure they were complying with the law was to not use SpoofCards at all, meaning that the law regulated commerce outside of Florida in violation of the Commerce Clause.
