We are in the first quarter of 2025, and so far, the Federal Communications Commission’s (FCC) one-to-one consent rule, which attempted to redefine the term prior express written consent, under the Telephone Consumer Protection Act (TCPA), has been set aside.
The rule was to be effective on January 27, 2025. Upon filling out consent forms online, the rule would have required sellers to obtain consent directly from the consumer, and in turn, the consumer would have had to select the entities with whom they would grant consent. Additionally, the consent would have been required to be “logically and topically” related to the interaction that prompted consent. The FCC Order postponed the effective date by one year, January 26, 2026.
Subsequently, the Insurance Marketing Coalition (IMC) achieved success with their petition, which was filed with the Eleventh Circuit Court of Appeals, that challenged the FCC’s authority to change the meaning of “prior express consent”.
The Eleventh Circuit vacated the one-to-one consent rule, as well as the “logically and topically” related requirement and sent the case back to the FCC for further proceedings. It concluded that the FCC reached beyond its authority.
The adopted version is no longer effective:
47 CFR 64.1200(f)(9)
The term prior express written consent means an agreement, in writing, that bears the signature of the person called or texted that clearly and conspicuously authorizes no more than one identified seller to deliver or cause to be delivered to the person called or texted advertisements or telemarketing messages using an automatic telephone dialing system or an artificial or prerecorded voice. Calls and texts must be logically and topically associated with the interaction that prompted the consent and the agreement must identify the telephone number to which the signatory authorizes such advertisements or telemarketing messages to be delivered.
The previous version remains effective:
47 CFR 64.1200(f)(9)
The term prior express written consent means an agreement, in writing, bearing the signature of the person called that clearly authorizes the seller to deliver or cause to be delivered to the person called advertisements or telemarketing messages using an automatic telephone dialing system or an artificial or prerecorded voice, and telephone number to which the signatory authorizes such advertisements or telemarketing messages to be delivered.
The court stated that consent should be “clear and unmistakable,” so prior express written consent has not been weakened.
Keep in mind that the Federal Trade Commission’s (FTC) Telemarketing Sales Rule (TSR) had already required sellers to directly obtain the consumer’s prior signed written agreement to receive prerecorded marketing calls prior to these events and still does. There is still a requirement to obtain one-to-one consent in some cases.
Meanwhile, Carriers stood up a process to comply with the one-to-one consent rule long before the effective date, requiring companies to show proof of their procedures for obtaining one-to-one consent when registering their SMS campaigns and going as far as requiring that privacy policies made no mention of sharing consent with affiliates. This too will need to be dismantled and reverted to the previous version of the TCPA consent rule requirement.
Moreover, as Carriers follow the Cellular Telecommunications Industry Association’s CTIA guidelines for wireless communications, and exercise their ability to block unwanted calls using self-defined reasonable analytics, complaints are being generated from businesses stating that their calls are not getting through to consumers who have consented to receive them.
The Responsible Enterprise Against Consumer Harassment (REACH) filed a petition with the FCC to ban Carriers from blocking and mislabeling compliant calls and texts to consumers.
This year also brings the FCC’s TCPA Revocation Rule, which becomes effective on April 11, 2025.
The intent of the rule is to make it easier for consumers to revoke consent from receiving unwanted “robocalls” and “robotexts,” and those sending such calls and texts must honor opt-out request within 10 business days. Consumers must also be allowed to revoke consent in any reasonable manner.
A revocation will apply to all types of calls or texts from the sender, for example, informational or solicitations. Upon receiving an opt-out request, the sender may send one additional message to clarify the revocation.
The FCC held an Open Meeting on February 27, 2025, and voted to expand their efforts to stop scam calls by broadening the use of the do-not-originate lists by voice service providers to block illegal calls.
Legitimate callers will be informed when their calls are wrongfully blocked by a newly developed Session Initiation Protocol (SIP) code, 603+, to help in preventing further blocking of their calls.
Most recently, to promote the policies of President Trump’s Executive Order, Unleashing Prosperity Through Deregulation, the FCC issued a Public Notice and is seeking input on identifying which of its rules to repeal in an effort to remove the burden of unnecessary regulations.
This is a deregulatory initiative in which the FCC seeks public comments. The agency believes that less regulations would encourage American businesses to invest in innovation and it would eliminate restrictions that hinder expansion and competition.
Additionally, for each new regulation issued, ten existing regulations will be repealed, known as the ten-for-one rule.
The FCC would like input that addresses experiences that have been gained from the implementation of rules, marketplace and technological changes that may deem a rule unnecessary, and which regulations pose a barrier to access into the communications marketplace, based on the cost of competition.
The agency also seeks comments to consider whether the adoption of industry standards or self-regulation has sufficiently diminished the need for certain regulations, whether there is evidence that changes in the governing legal framework is necessary and should be revised and identifying Code of Federal Regulations that are no longer serviceable.
Interested parties may file comments at https://www.fcc.gov/ecfs/ under GN Docket No. 25-133, on or before April 11, 2025, and the reply comment date is April 28, 2025.
As the rules to comply continue to change, we are here to keep you informed and to support you. Here are the Contact Center Compliance solutions that can effectively help guide you through these changes confidently.
You can subscribe to our comprehensive Compliance Guide, which is always up-to-date to keep you informed of the latest dialing laws and regulatory changes. It is also accessible anytime and available on your desktop or mobile devices.
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