FTC announces winners for Robocall Challenge

By Sandra Latouff, NCL Fraud and Policy Intern

Last week, the FTC announced the winners of the Robocall Challenge. The winners, Serdar Danis and Aaron Foss will each be receiving $25,000 and a trip to Washington, DC for an opportunity to present their innovations. The Challenge asked innovators to create solutions that will block illegal robocalls for both landlines and mobile phones. A robocall is a term for a phone call that uses a computerized auto dialer to deliver a pre-recorded message.

In 2012, the FTC received about 200,000 complaints per month from consumers about robocalls! In an effort to fend off robocalls, some consumers have turned to the FTC’s Do Not Call Registry. Currently, 220 million consumers have registered their numbers on the Registry, but even with the Registry consumers nationwide are still being pestered by robocalls. In an effort to help the public fight against the creative methods robocalls are reaching consumers, the FTC created the Robocall Challenge to gather creative and efficient ideas from participants that could be successful. The hope of the FTC is that by hosting the Robocall Challenge a winning idea will catch the attention of private companies and eventually find its way to the marketplace for consumer protection.

Danis’s proposal, titled “Robocall Filtering System and Device with Autonomous Blacklisting, Whitelisting, GrayListing and Caller ID Spoof Detection”, would analyze and block robocalls using software that could be implemented as a mobile app, an electronic device in a user’s home, or a feature of a provider’s telephone service. Foss’s proposal, called Nomorobo, is a cloud-based solution that would use “simultaneous ringing,” which allows incoming calls to be routed to a second telephone line. In the Nomorobo solution, this second line would identify and hang up on illegal robocalls before they could ring through to the user. A third proposal from Google engineers Daniel Klein and Dean Jackson won the Technology Achievement Award. Klen and Jackson’s solution would involve using automated algorithms that identify “spam” callers.

As a result of the Robocall Challenge, the FTC created a video compiling submissions that focused on what consumers are doing right now to reduce illegal robocalls. Here are some of the tips:

1. Ask you carrier what services they provide. Some service providers allow their customers to block off certain phone numbers. There may or may not be a charge for this service. Consumers may also be able to use VoIP hardware that allows them to tag any incoming number as unwanted which then plays a disconnected tone to the caller. After this, there is usually no second call.
2. Check out devices for your landline. Search Internet shopping sites for “call blocker.” One consumer said that she uses a special phone that causes robocaller software to drop her number from their call list, which reduced and eventually stopped the number of calls she received.
3. Experiment with “special information tones.” Some consumers placed the three note “non-working number” ringtone at the beginning of their voicemail or answering machine message which resulted in fewer robocalls.
4. Investigate apps for your smart phone. Consumers are paying for apps that block robocalls. There are some free apps that, based on reviews, perform decently as well.
5. Use a “virtual phone line” with call screening options. One consumer obtained a virtual phone line that forwarded the calls from that line to his actual phone. He gives his virtual number to everyone and keeps his other phone number to himself.

Consumers should also be sure to check the Terms of Service for any new program or offer when applying. An agreement to receive phone calls (i.e. robocalls) may be buried deep within the fine print.

If you have any tips or suggestions on how you prevent or stop robocalls, the FTC invites consumers to share their knowledge on their Facebook page. Click here for more information about the Robocall Challenge and its winners.

NCL unveils the Script Your Future campaign! Watch live!

NCL is proud to announce that Script Your Future, our national public education campaign, launches today! The campaign is designed to help consumers take back their health by helping them take their medicine as directed.

The U.S. Surgeon General, Dr. Regina M. Benjamin, will help kick off the campaign at The George Washington University Hospital. Watch the live stream on our Facebook page or on our Ustream page starting at 11 am!

Non-adherence, or failing to take medicine as directed, is a growing problem in the Unites States. Research shows that three out of four Americans are non-adherent and approximately 125,000 deaths per year in the U.S are linked non-adherence.

To combat this troubling trend, the centerpiece of the first-of-its-kind, multi-year campaign is the www.ScriptYourFuture.org website, which provides tools to help patients follow their prescribed medication schedule. The site includes a variety of helpful features such as free text message reminders, sample questions, medication lists and charts to keep track of medicines, and fact sheets on common chronic conditions such as diabetes, asthma and high blood pressure.

Today’s launch introduces the consumer face of the campaign. A companion site with adherence tools for health care professionals, www.ScriptYourFuture.org/HCP, was launched in March.

For more information on the importance of medication adherence click here to view the briefing paper co-authored by NCL and Duke University.

Food manufacturers’ claims ‘ripe’ with deception

When you reach for a bottle of spaghetti or pizza sauce at your local supermarket, would you rather the product be made from fresh, California vine-ripened tomatoes or reconstituted from industrial tomato concentrate? Food manufacturers like Del Monte and Contadina are guessing you prefer fresh ingredients in your food, and are going so far as to place false, misleading labeling on some of their products to entice consumers to buy them.

Unscrupulous food manufactures slapping inaccurate statements on their products to justify premium prices is nothing new. In the tomato sauce industry, concentrated tomato paste is often mixed with water to produce a common, accepted, and budget-friendly tomato sauce, and the ingredients list on such a product should indicate a concentrate was involved. If a product made from concentrate, however, includes claims such as “packed full of premium vine-ripened tomatoes,” “select 100% California tomatoes” and “packed in season,” these are deceptive practices under federal food labeling law.

NCL has been keeping an eye on this “from concentrate” and other food labeling issue for decades. In 2009 NCL wrote to the FDA asking the federal watchdog to crack down on misleading claims on tomato sauces. Products that NCL points to as deceptively labeled today include:

• Del Monte Seafood Cocktail Sauce that claims “Made from California Vine-ripened Tomatoes” on the front of the package when, in fact, it is made from concentrate (tomato paste and added water). An image of a vine-ripened tomato appears directly below the claim.

• Classico Tomato & Basil Pasta Sauce that states on the label “In colorful Naples, pasta sauces are pure and simple, with ripe, red tomatoes…” when the product is actually made from concentrate. The claim has been deleted from new “value size” jars of the sauce, but still appears on the label of the regular size product.

• Contadina Pizza Sauce and Contadina Puree that state “Contadina picks the Freshest Tomatoes,” and “Our vine-ripened Roma style tomatoes are grown to a rich red color before picking…”

Back in 2009 NCL wrote to FDA to urge the agency to warn the food industry that claims implying that products are made from fresh ingredients when they are actually made from concentrate are deceptive under federal law. NCL also requested that FDA require that all fruit and vegetable products remanufactured from concentrate state “From Concentrate” on the fronts of food packages.

NCL is happy to report that since issuing the FDA complaint, the largest producer of tomato sauces, ConAgra Foods, has taken some corrective steps. The company’s Hunt’s brand removed the claim “Packed full of premium vine-ripened tomatoes” from its tomato sauce label, and the words “packed in season” were removed from the company’s Angela Mia Pizza Sauce label. Other misleading claims remain and work still needs to be done, but ConAgra has taken strides in the right direction.

In tough economic times, when consumers are still carefully monitoring their budgets and fuel and food prices continue to rise, having accurate pricing and product information is more important than ever; there is simply no room for duping consumers with false product information.

LifeSmarts: Teens’ Consumer Rights Information Destination

By John Breyault, Vice President of Public Policy, Telecommunications and Fraud

As National Consumer Protection Week 2011 draws to a close, it is appropriate to reflect on why this week is set aside to celebrate consumer protection.  NCL has been at the center of the consumer movement since its inception over a century ago.  A short an incomplete list of consumer protection triumphs in that time would include the Pure Food and Drug Act of 1906 which created the FDA, the Federal Trade Commission Act of 1914, the Fair Credit Reporting Act of 1970, the Consumer Product Safety Act of 1972, the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act of 2010 and the Dodd-Frank Wall Street Reform and Consumer Protection Act of 2010.

What do all of these disparate pieces of legislation share in common?  They all sought to make the market safer and fairer for consumers.  They all recognized that absent safeguards and prudent regulations, consumers stood little chance against the vastly greater resources of industry.  During National Consumer Protection Week, we encourage consumers to take full advantage of the consumer rights gained over this century of advocacy to make better-informed marketplace decisions.

It is the desire to pass on these rights and responsibilities to the next generation that motivates NCL’s LifeSmarts program.  LifeSmarts is about more than just teens memorizing esoteric consumer trivia.  It’s about giving young people on the cusp of adulthood the knowledge they will need to enter life as empowered consumers.  Every time that a LifeSmarts alumna uses the skills she gained from LifeSmarts to get a better deal on a mortgage, steer clear of an Internet scam or spot a safety hazard in her home, consumers win just a little bit more.

It is with this purpose in mind that we encourage LifeSmarts competitors to learn and understand their rights as American consumers.  In other countries, citizens must too often accept the lot that their markets deal to them.  In America, we are protected by a web of consumer protections that ensure that the water we drink is clean, that banks can’t cheat us, and that the products we buy for our children aren’t accidents waiting to happen.  When these rights are violated, LifeSmarts teens know that they can speak up and seek redress.  In an increasingly interconnected and global marketplace, having the knowledge and the tools to use it has never been more important.

National Consumer Protection Week ends March 12, but the lessons and responsibilities of NCPW and of LifeSmarts will last a lifetime.

A Valentine to the Capital Area Food Bank

As part of a settlement with a cereal manufacturer, the NCL organized the delivery of close to 100,000 boxes of cereal to the Capital Area Food Bank.

By Sally Greenberg, NCL Executive Director

Monday afternoon, NCL staff paid a visit to the Capital Area Food Bank, the Washington DC area’s largest food distribution facility. With me on the visit were Courtney Brein, our Linda Golodner Food Safety and Nutrition Fellow, Daniel Dahlman, our new communications associate, and Karen Marcus, of Finkelstein Thompson, the law firm that represented NCL in the suit.

NCL’s connection to the CAFB stems from NCL’s case against a cereal manufacturer for false and deceptive advertising. The case settled in 2010, and as part of the settlement, NCL arranged to have 96,000 boxes of cereal delivered to the food bank for distribution throughout some of the poorest neighborhoods in the District. We didn’t know this at the time we negotiated this contribution, but the CAFB told us that cereal is in great demand because it is so expensive, and having cereal in this volume will delight food bank clients.

Lynn Brantley, the CAFB’s renown Executive Director and one of the bank’s founders, greeted us at the entrance. She described how the bank got its start in the 1970s as part of an interfaith campaign drive to address hunger in the District. The CAFB then distributed 1 million pounds of food a year; the facility has grown by leaps and bounds since then, serving 700 distribution facilities in the metropolitan area, including food pantries, soup kitchens, child care providers, faith-based organizations, group homes, senior centers, shelters and youth programs. Today the bank distributes 28 million pounds a year of food, including a great deal of fresh produce.

What I found most interesting were the pre-packed bags of food intended for school children and seniors. CAFB’s Molly McGlinchy, who led us on the tour, told us that a lot of kids whose families run low on money toward the end of the month may get breakfast and lunch at school, but they’ll miss an evening meal. They are sent home over the weekend or at night, therefore, with a bag that includes a box of spaghetti, cans of green beans and pears and peaches, and a big jar of red pasta sauce.

The seniors’ package contained similar nutritious foods. In addition to the donations the CAFB receives, the bank also buys food at reduced rates from retailers. We saw food of every description – cans of Vienna sausage, canned chili with and without meat, peanut butter, cake and brownie mixes (very popular!) even vitaminwater!
NCL is proud indeed that our efforts to prevent false and deceptive advertising in the cereal marketplace resulted in this bountiful contribution to the Capital Area Food Bank. The visit today to CAFB reinforced NCL’s historical connection to those in society who suffer from hunger and poverty. We were really so pleased to be able to direct nearly 100,000 boxes of cereal to those in greatest need of nutritious food.

Election Day excitement

By Sally Greenberg, NCL Executive Director

As we come off the election last week, we’re reminded that early leaders of the National Consumers League were deeply involved in local elections. Florence Kelley and Jane Addams, from their perch at Hull House in Chicago, worked to defeat corrupt local officials and elect those who shared their concerns about child and sweatshop labor, then known as one of the leaders of the “boodlers,” as corrupt city officials were called.

I personally have always enjoyed Election Day. Ever since I was a kid and my mother would take her with me to vote, election day carries with it a sense of excitement. As Florence Kelley and Jane Addams knew, “all politics are local.” I experienced that during last week’s election; not only did I have my hopes set on the election of a number of consumer-friendly candidates locally and around the country, I myself was listed on my local ballot, running for a neighborhood advisory post that serves as the voice for the local community. I didn’t win, but nevertheless the process was unexpectedly rewarding.

I needed to be at my polling site catching the early voters and handing out literature by 7 am. I’ve never been to any polling site at that hour! But I wasn’t alone. By the time I arrived at 6:45 am, there were signs up and down the street from candidates running in the District of Columbia. And throughout the day I met my neighbors and friends, exchanged tidbits of information, learned about their concerns on traffic, pedestrian safety, or trash collection. We were visited by local officials: Mary Cheh, our Ward 3 city council member, our school board representative, and our new Mayor-elect, Vincent Gray. All stopped to chat and exchange information about turnout and who was likely to win what post.

Perhaps most moving were the elderly voters who came out. One woman moved down the street slowly but deliberately, her walker outfitted with a stylish Burberry pattern that matched her purse. Another gentleman, coming from the nearby assisted living facility, was bent all the way over his walker, but he moved at a swift pace up the hill to the church that served as our polling place. I walked him down the street after he voted, and he had a smile on his face as we talked, though he did complain that since he moved to the District, he couldn’t vote for a member of Congress! A valid criticism indeed, since District residents don’t have a vote in Congress.

I remained at the polls till they closed at 8 pm. Friends came and helped me hand out literature; another friend took me for a quick lunch break; I picked up my 15-year-old son from school and brought him to the polling place for a bit. Yes, there were a few dull moments, but all in all it was a great day and a terrific face-to-face exercise in civic involvement. Friends have asked me if I will run again for this local position. The answer is I don’t know, but the rewards of being on the ballot were a lot bigger than I ever imagined.

Kudos to Maggie’s Organics’ fair labor certified apparel

By Elizabeth Gardner, NCL public policy intern

It didn’t make much of a blip on the national news radar, but Maggie’s Organics recently broke new ground with their Fair Labor Certified Apparel Line. From the growers of the cotton to the spinners, knitters, dyers, cutters, sewers, screen-printers, and warehouse workers, this Michigan-based company’s spring apparel line is independently certified to hold to fair labor standards.

This label is one of the first of its kind in the clothing industry. Florence Kelley and the National Consumers League actually pioneered a White Label for cotton underwear way back in 1899. It certified that factories bearing the label treated their employees fairly. And nowadays there’s the Good Weave label, which assures rug buyers that they’re purchasing a child-labor free product. Today, though, there’s really been no simple way for consumers to check whether their clothes are tainted by child labor or exploitative labor practices—until now. It may only be a first step, but this new fair labor line is something that concerned consumers can be excited about.

The certification for Maggie’s Organics was completed by Scientific Certification Systems, and it verifies that at “every point in the supply chain” “fair and equitable labor practices” were used. With evidence far too often surfacing that major clothes retailers use child labor or sweatshops in their production lines, this label is a valuable resource for those of us who want to make sure that what we put on our backs didn’t cost workers before us the shirts off their backs.

Looking at the big picture, Maggie’s Organics is a small company. This label is solid start for businesses though, and if the other brands who have called up Maggie’s to find out about the process follow through and become certified, we’ll be making sure strides. Alongside FREE2WORK, which grades companies for their labor standards and is a great shopping resource, consumers can hopefully expect to see more resources like this continue to crop up.

Fake checks bumped from No.1 spot at NCL’s Fraud Center

Six months into 2010, NCL’s Fraud Center is noticing some interesting trends in reports from consumers who have been approached by a scam or – even worse – fallen for one. Interestingly enough, for the first time in years (!), the number one scam reported to the Fraud Center is no longer fake checks – those rascally set-ups in which con artists send a realistic-looking fake check for payment for work done or the sale of an item, asking the victim to wire back some portion of the payment. Undoubtedly, the check is bad, and consumers are left owing their bank for the money they wired back.

Fake checks are still plaguing consumers, despite our education efforts, but they’re no longer the top scam reported to the Fraud Center. They’ve been bumped during this first period by general Internet merchandise scams, in which consumers buy something online and either receive something wildly different from what they thought they were purchasing or nothing at all!

Another thing NCL’s Fraud Center staff is noticing is an increase in scams perpetrated against the oldest age group, those over 65. This group of seniors saw the largest increase in complaints, a more than 5 percent increase vs. 2009.

NCL’s Fraud Center Director John Breyault warns that older consumers are particularly vulnerable to scams because they may not be as skeptical about bogus offers, and may be ashamed when they begin to suspect that they have fallen victim to a scam.

Signs that an older loved one may be involved in a fraud include: a sudden inability to pay monthly bills, unusually heavy volumes of junk mail or telemarketing calls, or a reluctance to discuss repeated large payments to “a friend.” Consumers concerned that an elderly friend or relative is a fraud victim should contact their local consumer protection office or state attorney general.

You can read the full 2010 Mid-Year Top Ten Scams report here.

Nine terms for labor: West Virginia’s favorite son and the relentless protection of workers and families

West Virginia’s Senator Robert C. Byrd – who died last week at age 92 – fought relentlessly for fair labor standards throughout his career as senator, which spanned five decades, making Robert Byrd the longest serving Senator in Congressional history. The National Consumers League celebrates his lifelong accomplishments, including vastly improving the conditions under which coal miners’ work.

Byrd fought for health care reform and greater access to higher education. And Byrd championed labor and employment protections, especially for mine workers. As President Cecil E. Roberts of the United Mine Workers of America said upon learning the news of Byrd’s passing, “The United Mine Workers and all coal-mining families have lost their best friend in U.S. Sen. Robert C. Byrd.”

To improve mine safety, Byrd secured funds to hire additional inspectors; he worked to develop newer and better safety equipment underground. In 1969, Byrd helped pass the Coal Miner Health and Safety Act and convinced President Nixon – who had threatened to veto the bill – not to do so. The passage of the Coal Miner bill helped to improve health and safety in the mining fields and likely saved thousands of lives. In fact, there was a ten-fold decrease in lives lost from the 40 years prior to passage of the bill to the 40 years after: recorded miners’ deaths totaled 32,000 before passage of the bill and 3,200 after. After passage of the act, Byrd continued to champion provisions to protect miners. He supported the 1977 improvements to the 1969 act and later fought to protect mining families by securing their access to health care. In 2006, he helped pass the Mine Improvement and New Emergency Response (MINER) Act, which ensures coal operators are planning, training for, and better able to respond to emergencies.

Byrd’s work on behalf of mining families is unparalleled, but Byrd will also be remembered for a number of other accomplishments. The West Virginia Senator co-sponsored the Employee Free Choice Act, to promote the ability of workers to form unions. Byrd dedicated substantial resources to improving access to education nationwide. His original concept for an honors scholarship in West Virginia soon became the model for the first and only federal based merit scholarship, the Robert C. Byrd Honor Scholarship Program. He brought money into the state for improved health facilities, medical schools, and medical care, expanding these benefits to other states across the U.S.

The Senate will not be the same without the unique presence of Robert Byrd of West Virginia. His legacy of landmark legislation -for miners, education, and health care – will be felt for decades to come. The National Consumers League mourns his passing but is grateful for all that he gave to American workers.

Unsanitary shipping pallets posing threats to food safety?

By Courtney Brein, Linda Golodner Food Safety and Nutrition Fellow

As the Linda Golodner Food Safety and Nutrition Fellow at the National Consumers League, I work on a wide range of food safety and nutrition issues. While, on the food safety front, the topics on which I focus run the gamut, ultimately, they all share a common purpose: improving the safety of the food that American consumers purchase, serve, and eat.

Due in part to a string of recent foodborne illness outbreaks, and in part to an administration that has chosen to prioritize improving food safety, the environment is ripe for making significant changes to – and expansions upon – the mechanisms currently in place for protecting our food supply. More than a year ago, President Obama created a White House Food Safety Working Group co-chaired by Secretary of Health and Human Services (HHS) Kathleen Sebelius and Secretary of Agriculture Tom Vilsack. The group has recommended a public health focused approach to food safety that prioritizes prevention and strengthens surveillance and enforcement, among other measures. On the Congressional front, FDA food safety modernization legislation passed in the House last summer and is slated to come to the Senate floor soon. The United States Department of Agriculture (USDA) recently set new performance standards for Salmonella and Campylobacter in young chickens and turkeys, in an effort to help prevent tens of thousands of illnesses every year. To help consumers stay up-to-date on recalls and other food safety issues, HHS and USDA launched www.foodsafety.gov last September. The list goes on.

Central to the creation of an effective food safety system is the assurance that measures are in place to protect products at every step of the way along the path from “farm to fork,” as the saying goes. While regulations and inspections help to ensure the safety of food grown on farms and produced in factories, and consumer education helps to reduce cross-contamination and unsafe cooking practices in the home, the area in between – the transportation of food from production to purchase point – remains largely overlooked and under-regulated.

Several months ago, NCL Executive Director Sally Greenberg and I began to wonder what role, if any, the pallets used to transport food might potentially play in the contamination of the food supply. Our first tip-off was McNeil’s recall of Tylenol and several other products this past December and January. The company linked the moldy, musty odor – and the unpleasant side-effects it caused in many individuals who consumed the products – to the wood pallets that were stored in the area where these products were made. According to McNeil, when a chemical used to treat the pallets started to break down, another chemical called TBA formed in the air and contaminated the products. When we realized that these pallets were, at least generally speaking, the same as the ones stacked behind many grocery stores, we started to wonder why the shipping platforms that transport food were being stored outside, and if there were any regulations governing the use of pallets.

Our research revealed that pallets are, in fact, more or less overlooked in the regulatory sphere. We decided to conduct exploratory testing of the pallets used to transport food, to determine whether the issue warranted a call for FDA’s consideration. We’ve been at this a long time – NCL first drew attention to potentially harmful products in 1904, when NCL volunteers staffing a booth at the 1904 St. Louis World’s Fair demonstrated to fairgoers that canned green beans touted by food processors as a labor-saving home product were adulterated with green dye. More than 100 years later, we continue this work; this past December, the League called on the FDA to investigate a “sweetened dried cranberry” product that our commissioned lab tests found to be mostly sugar, and made of cranberry skins rather than whole cranberries as advertised.

For this investigation, we tested pallets in the Miami/Tampa area and in Houston. We located a highly regarded lab that gave us strict instructions on taking samples and shipping them back, which we followed to the letter. Many of the pallets I saw – and tested – were really dirty, sullied with items ranging from bird droppings to fish scales. They were stored outside, exposed to the elements, and easily accessible to rodents, insects, and birds. I became intimately familiar with these shipping platforms – both wood and plastic – and the precise, methodical way in which one takes samples to send to a lab. In all, we took samples from 35 plastic pallets and 35 wood pallets in each metropolitan area, totaling 140 samples. We had no idea what our results would be.

As it turned out, our findings were significant – and alarming. The lab found E. coli on 10 percent of the 70 wood pallets we tested, and on 1.4 percent of the 70 plastic pallets. The lab report also revealed the presence of Listeria on 2.9 percent of the wood pallets, half of which further tested positive for Listeria monocytogenes. None of the plastic pallets tested positive for Listeria. High aerobic plate counts, which reflect unsanitary conditions of the pallets, were found on both types of pallets, with approximately one third of the wood pallets and one fifth of the plastic pallets showing the high counts.

While our exploratory testing included only a small number of pallets, we think it gives some indication that the sanitation and safety of the pallets used to transport food in the U.S. deserve a closer examination. This past Tuesday, therefore, the League sent a letter to FDA Commissioner Margaret Hamburg, sharing our findings, urging the agency to do its own testing, and calling on FDA to set standards that will help to ensure that pallets are cleaned and stored properly, thus minimizing the possibility that they will be implicated in the spread of foodborne illness. Additionally, we videotaped our testing – check it out.