Do-Not-Call Registry & Telemarketing Sales Rule

The Telemarketing and Consumer Fraud and Abuse Prevention Act (15 U.S.C. §§ 6101–6108), enacted in 1994, directed the FTC to issue rules prohibiting deceptive and abusive telemarketing practices. The resulting Telemarketing Sales Rule (TSR) (16 CFR Part 310), enforced by the Federal Trade Commission — together with the FCC's parallel rules under the Telephone Consumer Protection Act — created the National Do-Not-Call Registry, which now contains over 250 million phone numbers and is the most popular consumer protection program in the federal government's history. If your number is on the registry, most telemarketers must stop calling you within 31 days. The TSR also prohibits specific abusive practices: abandoned calls (calling and hanging up), caller ID spoofing for deceptive purposes, unauthorized billing (cramming), and calls before 8:00 AM or after 9:00 PM. Violations carry civil penalties of up to $53,088 per call (adjusted for inflation). The TSR works alongside the FCC's Telephone Consumer Protection Act (TCPA) rules, which regulate robocalls and autodialed calls separately. See also CAN-SPAM Act for email spam regulation and FCC Telecommunications for the broader regulatory framework. Despite aggressive enforcement — the FTC has brought hundreds of enforcement actions resulting in billions of dollars in judgments — illegal robocalls remain one of the top consumer complaints in America, with an estimated 4 billion+ robocalls per month in the U.S.

Current Law (2026)

Legal Authority

• 15 U.S.C. § 6101 — Findings (Congress finds that telemarketing fraud is a problem costing consumers billions annually and that consumers need protection from deceptive and abusive practices)
• 15 U.S.C. § 6102 — Telemarketing rules (directs the FTC to prescribe rules prohibiting deceptive and abusive telemarketing acts, including: false or misleading statements, unauthorized charges, calling at unreasonable hours, and patterns of calls intended to annoy or harass)
• 15 U.S.C. § 6103 — State enforcement (state attorneys general may bring civil actions in federal court for violations affecting their state's residents; court may award injunctions and damages)
• 15 U.S.C. § 6104 — Private actions (persons adversely affected by a pattern or practice of violations may sue in federal court; must give 30 days' notice to the FTC and state AG)

How It Works

Any U.S. consumer can register their phone number at donotcall.gov or by calling 1-888-382-1222 — free, and the registration is permanent until the number is disconnected or removed. Telemarketers must pay a fee based on the area codes they call, access the registry, and scrub their call lists at least every 31 days. Calling a registered number is a violation up to $53,088 per call. But the registry has meaningful gaps: political organizations, charities, and telephone surveyors are exempt entirely. Companies with an existing business relationship — a purchase within the past 18 months or an inquiry within the past 3 months — may call even registered numbers, though a company-specific do-not-call request (telling the caller to stop) overrides the relationship window immediately and permanently. The broader Telemarketing Sales Rule (TSR) imposes additional requirements regardless of registry status: no calls before 8:00 AM or after 9:00 PM in the recipient's time zone; accurate caller ID information must be transmitted; abandoned calls (failure to connect a live representative within 2 seconds of the consumer answering) are prohibited; and no false or misleading statements, unauthorized charges, or deceptive negative-option offers.

Enforcement combines FTC civil actions, state AG authority, and consumer litigation. The FTC has obtained judgments in the hundreds of millions against large-scale telemarketing and robocall operations. State attorneys general can bring independent civil actions in federal court under 15 U.S.C. § 6103. Individual consumers can sue for violations demonstrating a pattern or practice — not just a single call. Practical reality: the registry and TSR are largely effective against compliant U.S. commercial telemarketers, but the 4+ billion illegal robocalls per month that constitute the modern robocall crisis originate primarily from overseas scammers using spoofed caller ID — a category that is largely immune to domestic registry enforcement and requires international cooperation, carrier-level authentication (STIR/SHAKEN), and gateway provider accountability to address.

How It Affects You

If you're a consumer getting unwanted calls despite being on the registry: Registration at donotcall.gov is free and permanent — your number stays until you remove it or it's disconnected. Within 31 days of registration, most commercial telemarketers must stop calling. If they continue, file a complaint at donotcall.gov; the FTC uses aggregated complaint data to identify the largest violators and prioritize enforcement. For company-specific do-not-call requests: even if you're not on the national registry, telling a company "don't call me again" creates a direct obligation they must honor — if they call back, that's a separate $53,088-per-call violation. Practical reality check: political calls, charitable solicitations, and telephone surveys are exempt from Do-Not-Call rules — no registration stops those. And the robocall crisis — 4+ billion illegal calls per month, most from overseas scammers using spoofed caller ID — is largely immune to registry enforcement. For scam robocalls: hang up, report to the FTC at reportfraud.ftc.gov (the reports build data used for enforcement priority), and never press 1 to "opt out" — it confirms your number is active and increases call volume.

If you're a business that does outbound calling or telemarketing: The compliance framework has three layers: the national registry (access via telemarketers.donotcall.gov, scrub your call list every 31 days — penalty is per call, not per campaign); your company-specific do-not-call list (requests must be honored for at least 5 years); and TSR substantive rules (calling hours 8 AM–9 PM in the recipient's time zone, accurate caller ID transmission, no abandoned calls, no false or misleading statements, no unauthorized billing). Civil penalties run up to $53,088 per violation — not per campaign, per individual call. For high-volume outbound programs, the FTC's largest judgments have run into the hundreds of millions. An important exception: you may call customers within 18 months of a purchase or 3 months of an inquiry even if they're on the registry — but if they give you a company-specific do-not-call request, that overrides the relationship window immediately and permanently.

If you're a small business owner doing your own marketing calls: Do-Not-Call rules apply to you the same as to large telemarketers — no small-business exemption exists. But the existing business relationship exception is broad enough to cover most typical small-business outbound calling: customers who bought from you in the past 18 months, or who requested information within the past 3 months, can be called even if they're on the national registry. What you cannot do: buy a lead list and start cold-calling people on the registry without scrubbing first. Minimum compliance steps before any outbound campaign: scrub your list against the national registry via the FTC's portal ($72/area code annually), maintain a company-specific do-not-call list, document your scrubbing dates, and brief anyone making calls on the calling-hour restrictions and caller ID requirements. "I didn't know" is not a defense in FTC enforcement.

If you're a state attorney general, regulator, or working in robocall policy: Under 15 U.S.C. § 6103, state AGs have independent authority to bring civil actions in federal court for TSR violations affecting their residents — without waiting for the FTC. Multi-state enforcement coalitions have been among the most effective tools against large robocall operations, particularly where interstate coordination tracing calls back to originating carriers is needed. The FCC's STIR/SHAKEN caller ID authentication framework (effective June 2021) has reduced spoofed-number robocall traffic from larger carriers, but VoIP gateway providers and overseas originators remain enforcement gaps. The robocall problem is fundamentally an international enforcement problem: most illegal call volume originates from overseas boiler rooms using VoIP to generate calls that appear local. International cooperation through the Industry Traceback Group, bilateral law enforcement agreements, and FCC/FTC coordination with foreign telecom regulators have had targeted success shutting down specific operations but haven't broken the underlying economics that favor scammers.

State Variations

The TSR creates a federal floor; many states add protections:

• Over 40 states maintain their own do-not-call registries (many integrated with the federal registry)
• State telemarketing laws may impose additional registration requirements, bonding, and disclosure obligations
• Some states have stricter calling-hour restrictions or broader definitions of prohibited practices

• State penalties for telemarketing violations may exceed federal penalties
• State consumer protection laws provide additional remedies beyond the federal TSR

Implementing Regulations

• 16 CFR Part 310 — FTC Telemarketing Sales Rule: the primary implementing regulation for the Telemarketing and Consumer Fraud and Abuse Prevention Act. Key provisions:

  • § 310.3 — Deceptive acts: before any customer agrees to pay, a telemarketer must clearly disclose (1) the total cost of goods or services; (2) any material restrictions or conditions; (3) if no refund policy, that fact; (4) the seller's identity; prize promotions must disclose odds, the no-purchase-necessary alternative, and any conditions before requiring anything of the consumer
  • § 310.4 — Abusive acts: outright prohibitions include: calling someone on the National Do Not Call Registry; calling before 8 AM or after 9 PM (recipient's local time); failing to transmit caller ID; abandoning calls (hanging up without connecting to a live agent within 2 seconds); using threats, profanity, or obscene language; soliciting payment for "recovery services" where advance fees are charged to recover money previously lost to fraud. The advance fee prohibition (§ 310.4(a)) is one of the TSR's most significant provisions — it prohibits charging any fee before delivering promised debt-relief, credit-repair, or lottery-winning services, targeting the most common telemarketing fraud structures
  • § 310.4(b)(1)(v) — Do Not Call Registry: telemarketers must check the FTC's DNC Registry every 31 days and may not call registered numbers; internal company-specific DNC lists must also be maintained and honored; a consumer who asks to be placed on an internal DNC list must not be called again by that seller
  • § 310.5 — Recordkeeping: sellers and telemarketers must retain advertising scripts, promotional materials, customer call records, and employee records for 5 years — giving FTC investigators a full paper trail for enforcement
  • § 310.6 — Exemptions: solicitations for charitable contributions are exempt from the DNC requirements (charities may still call registry registrants); calls to existing business relationships (customer called within the past 18 months) are also exempt; B2B calls are generally exempt

  The TSR applies to any telemarketer calling from or into the United States; the FTC and state attorneys general both have enforcement authority. The maximum civil penalty is $53,088 per violation (adjusted for inflation), with each individual illegal call constituting a separate violation — courts have entered judgments in the tens of millions of dollars against robocall operations. Recent rulemakings: the FTC updated TSR's prerecorded call provisions in 88 FR 84040 (December 2023) to strengthen "express written consent" standards for robocalls amid the explosion of AI-generated voice scams.

• 47 CFR 64.1200 — FCC rules implementing the Telephone Consumer Protection Act, covering autodialer restrictions, Do Not Call compliance obligations, prior express consent requirements for autodialed and prerecorded calls, and the reassigned numbers database that carriers must consult before calling

Pending Legislation

Telemarketing and robocall provisions appear in broader consumer protection legislation — see FTC Consumer Protection and TCPA Telemarketing.

Recent Developments

The robocall epidemic remains the dominant telemarketing enforcement challenge. Despite Do-Not-Call rules and TCPA enforcement, Americans receive an estimated 4+ billion robocalls per month — most from scammers using spoofed caller ID and offshore operations beyond U.S. enforcement reach. The FCC's STIR/SHAKEN framework (requiring voice providers to authenticate caller ID) has reduced some spoofed calls, but sophisticated fraud operations continue to adapt. The FTC and FCC have pursued aggressive enforcement — Operation Call It Quits, Project Point of No Return, and similar initiatives have shut down billions of illegal robocalls. Voice-over-IP technology and international calling make enforcement particularly difficult, as many illegal robocall operations originate overseas.

In early March 2026, the FTC published its Trade Regulation Rule on Unfair or Deceptive Fees (the "junk fees" rule), with consumer groups including Consumer Federation of America, Consumer Reports, and others expressing support for the rulemaking to combat hidden and misleading fees. Many robocall scams target consumers for identity theft; the intersection of telemarketing fraud with broader data privacy law is a growing enforcement focus.

2026 inflation adjustment cancelled (OMB M-26-11): The annual CMP inflation adjustment for 2026 was cancelled by OMB Memo M-26-11 (April 17, 2026) because October 2025 CPI-U data was unavailable due to the appropriations lapse. The 2025 TSR civil penalty level of $53,088 per violation remains operative through 2026.