Ofcom's powers to deal with ‘persistent misuse’

The statement replaces that published by Oftel, the regulator's predecessor, in August last year.

As required under the Communications Act 2003, the statement clarifies when and how Ofcom can take action against those who persistently misuse networks or services to cause another person "unnecessarily to suffer annoyance, inconvenience or anxiety", but do not actually commit a criminal offence.

It is essentially a consumer protection measure to deal with nuisance behaviour, and is unlikely to be used where an alternative legal remedy is available – for example, in dealing with spammers or hackers.

According to the statement, Ofcom will act where there has been:

• Misuse of automatic calling equipment, such as are found in call centres;
• Silent or short duration calls;
• Number-scanning, which is used to find out which numbers are active or not;
• Misuse of a calling line identification facility, such as the 1471 feature on most telephones;
• Misuse for dishonest gain, such as for the exploitation of premium rate numbers; and
• The use of allocated telephone numbers, for purposes other that set out in the National Telephone Numbering Plan.

Where there has been persistent misuse, Ofcom will issue a notification to the person it believes responsible. This can then be followed by an enforcement notice and/or a penalty of up to £5,000.

See: The policy statement