HEALTH INSURANCE TELEMARKETER FACES RECORD FCC FINE
OF $225 MILLION FOR SPOOFED ROBOCALLS
Robocaller Transmitted Approximately 1 Billion Sales Calls in Fewer Than 5 Months
—
WASHINGTON, March 17, 2021—The Federal Communications Commission today fined
Texas-based telemarketers $225 million—the largest fine in FCC history—for transmitting
approximately 1 billion robocalls, many of them illegally spoofed, to sell short-term, limitedduration health insurance plans. The robocalls falsely claimed to offer health insurance plans
from well-known health insurance companies such as Blue Cross Blue Shield and Cigna.
John C. Spiller and Jakob A. Mears, who used business names including Rising Eagle and
JSquared Telecom, transmitted the spoofed robocalls across the country during the first fourand-a-half months of 2019. Mr. Spiller admitted to the USTelecom Industry Traceback Group
that he made millions of spoofed calls per day and knowingly called consumers on the Do Not
Call list as he believed that it was more profitable to target these consumers. Rising Eagle
made the calls on behalf of clients, the largest of which, Health Advisors of America, was sued
by the Missouri Attorney General for telemarketing violations in February 2019.
Beginning in 2018, there was an increase in consumer complaints and robocall traffic related to
health insurance and other health care products, with approximately 23.6 million health
insurance robocalls crossing the networks of the four largest wireless carriers each day. Rising
Eagle originated a large portion of this unwelcome robocall traffic.
The Truth in Caller ID Act prohibits manipulating caller ID information with the intent to
defraud, cause harm, or wrongfully obtain anything of value. The FCC’s investigation found
that the Rising Eagle spoofed its robocalls to deceive consumers and caused at least one
company whose caller IDs were spoofed to become overwhelmed with angry call-backs from
aggrieved consumers.