[Congressional Bills 111th Congress]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office]
[H.R. 1258 Introduced in House (IH)]

111th CONGRESS
  1st Session
                                H. R. 1258

  To amend the Communications Act of 1934 to prohibit manipulation of 
       caller identification information, and for other purposes.


_______________________________________________________________________


                    IN THE HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES

                             March 3, 2009

    Mr. Engel (for himself and Mr. Barton of Texas) introduced the 
   following bill; which was referred to the Committee on Energy and 
                                Commerce

_______________________________________________________________________

                                 A BILL


 
  To amend the Communications Act of 1934 to prohibit manipulation of 
       caller identification information, and for other purposes.

    Be it enacted by the Senate and House of Representatives of the 
United States of America in Congress assembled,

SECTION 1. SHORT TITLE.

    This Act may be cited as the ``Truth in Caller ID Act of 2009''.

SEC. 2. PROHIBITION REGARDING MANIPULATION OF CALLER IDENTIFICATION 
              INFORMATION.

    Section 227 of the Communications Act of 1934 (47 U.S.C. 227) is 
amended--
            (1) by redesignating subsections (e), (f), and (g) as 
        subsections (f), (g), and (h), respectively; and
            (2) by inserting after subsection (d) the following new 
        subsection:
    ``(e) Prohibition on Provision of Deceptive Caller Identification 
Information.--
            ``(1) In general.--It shall be unlawful for any person 
        within the United States, in connection with any 
        telecommunications service or VOIP service, to cause any caller 
        identification service to transmit misleading or inaccurate 
        caller identification information, with the intent to defraud 
        or cause harm.
            ``(2) Protection for blocking caller identification 
        information.--Nothing in this subsection may be construed to 
        prevent or restrict any person from blocking the capability of 
        any caller identification service to transmit caller 
        identification information.
            ``(3) Regulations.--
                    ``(A) Deadline.--Not later than 6 months after the 
                date of enactment of this subsection, the Commission 
                shall prescribe regulations to implement this 
                subsection.
                    ``(B) Consideration of related regulations.--In 
                conducting the proceeding to prescribe the regulations 
                required by subparagraph (A) of this paragraph, the 
                Commission shall examine whether the Commission's 
                regulations under subsection (b)(2)(B) of this section 
                should be revised to require non-commercial calls to 
                residential telephone lines using an artificial or pre-
                recorded voice to deliver a message to transmit caller 
                identification information that is not misleading or 
                inaccurate.
            ``(4) Effect on other laws.--Nothing in this subsection 
        shall be construed to authorize or prohibit any investigative, 
        protective, or intelligence activities performed in connection 
        with official duties, and in accordance with all applicable 
        laws, by a law enforcement agency of the United States, a 
        State, or a political subdivision of a State, or by an 
        intelligence agency of the United States.
            ``(5) Savings provision.--Except for paragraph (3)(B), 
        nothing in this subsection may be construed to affect or alter 
        the application of the Commission's regulations regarding the 
        requirements for transmission of caller identification 
        information, issued pursuant to the Telephone Consumer 
        Protection Act of 1991 (Public Law 102-243) and the amendments 
        made by such Act.
            ``(6) Definitions.--For purposes of this subsection:
                    ``(A) Caller identification information.--The term 
                `caller identification information' means information 
                provided to an end user by a caller identification 
                service regarding the telephone number of, or other 
                information regarding the origination of, a call made 
                using a telecommunications service or VOIP service.
                    ``(B) Caller identification service.--The term 
                `caller identification service' means any service or 
                device designed to provide the user of the service or 
                device with the telephone number of, or other 
                information regarding the origination of, a call made 
                using a telecommunications service or VOIP service. 
                Such term includes automatic number identification 
                services.
                    ``(C) VOIP service.--The term `VOIP service' means 
                a service that--
                            ``(i) provides real-time voice 
                        communications transmitted through end user 
                        equipment using TCP/IP protocol, or a successor 
                        protocol, for a fee or without a fee;
                            ``(ii) is offered to the public, or such 
                        classes of users as to be effectively available 
                        to the public (whether part of a bundle of 
                        services or separately); and
                            ``(iii) has the capability to originate 
                        traffic to, or terminate traffic from, the 
                        public switched telephone network.''.
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