FTC Shuts Down Agoura Robocall Company

The Federal Trade Commission announced late last week that a federal judge’s temporary restraining order against an Agoura Hills company that allegedly made millions of illegal telemarketing calls has effectively shut down the company.

SBN Peripherals Inc. received notice of the restraining order a federal judge out of Chicago issued after a consumer complained to the FTC that SBN ignored multiple telemarketing laws while attempting to sell bogus credit card interest rate reduction programs and vehicle warranties.

Additionally, the complaint to the FTC alleged SBN made unauthorized prerecorded calls (also called “robocalls”) to households registered with the national Do Not Call Registry as well as without the written consent of consumers. Data from AT&T showed SBN made almost 2.5 million calls on a single day in April 2009 and almost 400 million in the last year.

Johan Hendrik Smit Duyzentkunst, SBN’s owner and CEO, told the press he believed his company was “a service provider and a totally legal entity” that provided the robocall service to telemarketers rather than initiating the calls themselves. Duyzentkunst estimated SBN had between 200 and 300 customers, including the Republic and Democratic National Committees.