FCC Fines Two Firms on Dial-a-Porn Calls

SAN FRANCISCO â€”  Launching a controversial crackdown on dial-a-porn operators, the Federal Communications Commission fined two Northern California companies $600,000 each Thursday, accusing them of failing to prevent children from buying their sexually explicit services.

Even as it announced its action against Intercambio Inc. of Santa Clara and Audio Enterprises Inc. of Mill Valley, the FCC said it has begun investigating two other California companies, 2001 Enterprises of Reseda and Ramrod Enterprises of Redding.

“It’s time we took steps. The ultimate sleaze deserves the ultimate . . . penalty,� said FCC Commissioner James H. Quello. “They need to know we mean business.�

Action Called Misguided

Outside the federal agency, the FCC’s actions were criticized as misguided and potentially unconstitutional.

“It’s horrible . . . nightmarish,� said Charles Ryan of the Information Providers Assn., a San Diego-based trade group for firms offering dial-a-joke, dial-a-prayer and other fee-based telephone information services.

“It’s an outright prohibition against (free) speech,� he said. “I think it will have a tough run in court. I don’t think it stands much of a chance to stand constitutional muster.�

The maximum fine for not restricting access to obscene telephone services is $50,000 for each day of violation. FCC spokesman Gerald Brock said the $600,000 fines in this ground-breaking case were based on the amount of money the companies made during the commission’s monitoring process.

In an 11-month period, Audio Enterprises made $650,000 from calls to one line, the spokesman said.

The so-called dial-a-porn lines use 976 numbers in which callers are charged from 20 cents to $2 per call, which last as long as three minutes and feature sexually explicit messages. The services are operated by independent companies that use telephone company lines and billing services.

In California alone, 275 companies provide nearly 1,000 dial-in services, ranging from the latest lottery results and soap-opera plot twists to eye-opening pornography. Overall, Californians spent $90.7 million on phone-in services last year, said Pacific Bell spokeswoman Lisa Lang.

About 40% of the dial-in numbers contain sexual messages, she said, but they are among the most profitable. Robert Gnaizda, a San Francisco public-interest lawyer who has represented consumer interests in the so-called “976� debate, said the dial-a-porn operations accounted for 62% of the phone-in industry’s billings.

Although Pacific Bell generates incomes from dial-a-porn services, Lang said the company “cooperates with providers of that service only because it is legally required to.� She said the company has sued in federal court in San Francisco for the right “as a private company, to choose who we do business with--then we would just decide not to do business with dial-a-porn companies.�

The fines levied on the California firms resulted from an FCC investigation triggered by complaints alleging that access to pornographic messages resulted in the molestation of one 10-year-old girl and so disturbed one teen that he had to enter weekly psychiatric therapy.

30 Days to Respond

Audio Enterprises is no longer in business and Intercambio did not respond to reporters’ phone calls Thursday. The firms have 30 days to pay or seek reduction of the fine. However, Ryan of the industry group was skeptical of assertions that the dial-a-porn services could have a dramatic effect on children’s behavior.

Earlier commission dial-a-porn rules had mandated the blocking of such messages through access codes, message scrambling or use of credit card numbers.

Upon being notified last December of the complaints, both companies said they did not have the capacity to provide access screening and denied that the messages were obscene. Intercambio also argued that it had not violated the regulation because it never intended to transmit interstate or to minors.