INDU report says government should act on fraud calls

The House industry committee is calling on the federal government to review legislation covering fraudulent calls, and for the government and regulators to support industry-based solutions to the issue. The committee put out a report Friday following its study into the threat of fraud and scam calls, which it began before the COVID-19 pandemic. Among its recommendations is for the government to review legislation “to ensure that it adequately and explicitly prohibits fraud calls, including fraud calls initiated by robocalls, and further review criminal fines, penalties, and enforcement with regards to Canadian and international laws.” The federal government should “support the development of industry-based solutions against fraud calls at a reasonable cost for consumers,” the committee said. The report also said authorities should work on improving availability and accessibility of data on fraud calls and should improve the information that is available to Canadians about the issue. It said businesses in federally-regulated industries, including telecoms, should have to publicly disclose on an annual basis “how many accounts they discovered had been opened using fraudulent information and how many individuals they contacted to notify them that their information was used for fraudulent purposes.” The report also asked the government to facilitate information sharing between the CRTC, the RCMP and other government bodies to coordinate a response to fraud calls. After Parliament was prorogued over the summer, the committee sent a letter to Innovation Minister Navdeep Bains saying the federal government must act to “prevent any further harm to Canadians.” Friday’s report repeated many of the recommendations that were in that letter, including supporting the implementation of the STIR/SHAKEN framework, for the CRTC to launch a “formal public inquiry” into unauthorized porting, and for the government to launch a public awareness campaign to warn Canadians against COVID-19−related fraud. The report acknowledged that the federal government has “limited direct power over the activities and decisions of arms-length organizations such as the RCMP and the CRTC.” But it can, it said, “encourage and support these organizations in addition to assuming responsibilities of its own.”

INDU report says government should act on fraud calls

Brief | November 27, 2020

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INDU report says government should act on fraud calls

Brief | November 27, 2020

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