TextMe Asks FCC for Clarity on TCPA Rules
Opposition to TextMe’s petition seeking clarity on FCC rules under the Telephone Consumer Protection Act is coming primarily from TCPA plaintiffs “all of whom have a direct financial interest in the continued misinterpretation of the TCPA,” said the company in reply comments. TextMe offers an app that enables users to send and receive non-commercial texts messages to or from contacts in the U.S. and to make free calls to other TextMe users.
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TextMe’s March 18 petition asked the FCC to clarify the meaning of the term capacity as used in the TCPA’s definition of automatic phone dialing system and clarify users of TextMe’s service, instead of the company, make or send calls or text messages for purposes of the TCPA (http://bit.ly/1oogpKa). April 7, the Consumer and Governmental Affairs Bureau sought comment on the petition (http://bit.ly/1ibrzgu). Replies were due Thursday in docket 02-278.
"The law continues to be interpreted by litigants in a manner that stifles innovation and interferes with personal, non-commercial communications,” TextMe said. “The clarifications requested by TextMe are necessary to prevent the TCPA from being read so broadly as to undermine legislative intent and deprive consumers of access to innovative products and services.
"Granting the relief requested by TextMe would not open a floodgate of ’spamviting,’ as some commenters have predicted,” TextMe said (http://bit.ly/1ttEK3r). “TextMe’s Petition concerns only non-telemarketing, informational calls or text messages to wireless numbers selected by the TextMe user, such that any clarification from the Commission would be so limited."
The Computer & Communications Industry Association supported TextMe, replying that the app’s capacity to make calls or send text messages to contacts in a user’s address book doesn’t mean it qualifies as an automatic phone dialing system under the TCPA. “TextMe’s app does not at present have the technical capabilities to dial numbers or send messages without the user’s input,” CCIA said (http://bit.ly/SsdzZu). “The FCC should interpret the term ‘capacity’ in the TCPA as describing the present capabilities of TextMe, not the theoretical or potential capacity. Imposing broad liability for possible updates to apps in the future would cripple the software industry and chill innovation.”
Communications Innovators, which represents high-technology companies, also backed TextMe. “To be considered an autodialer, equipment must have the ‘present ability’ (or ‘current ability') to store or produce numbers to be called, using a random or sequential number generator, and to dial such numbers,” the group said (http://bit.ly/TCHUWn). “Consistent with the text of the TCPA, any clarification in response to the TextMe Petition should apply to all voice calling and text messaging platforms that are used to make calls or deliver messages to wireless telephone numbers, not solely to TextMe’s messaging service.”
The FCC in March provided some additional clarity on the TCPA, saying package delivery notifications don’t violate the act and clarifying its applicability to administrative text messages sent by social networks (CD March 31 p7).