"Consent farms" enabled billions of illegal robocalls, feds say

Federal regulators on Tuesday announced a broad crackdown on what they called a "tide of illegal telemarketing calls" plaguing U.S. consumers. 

Samuel Levin, Director of the Federal Trade Commission's Bureau of Consumer Protection, said the effort will target telemarketers that continue to flout laws against robocalls as well as so-called consent farms, or firms that provide people's phone numbers to robocallers while falsely claiming that consumers have agreed to receive calls. Federal and state authorities will also target providers of internet phone service that enable illegal robocalls, he added.

The FTC — along with officials from the Federal Communications Commission and U.S. Department of Justice as well as state prosecutors from Ohio and Illinois — have already filed complaints against two of the nation's largest consent farms as part of the push to step up the government's fight against robocalls.