A Birmingham-based provider of monitored alarms, TMAC, has been fined £100,000 by the Information Commissioner’s Office after staff used false identities on marketing sales calls. TMAC made over 260,000 nuisance calls to numbers registered on the Telephone Preference Service, which is designed to opt people out of such communications.
The ICO said TMAC deliberately targeted individuals over 60 in predatory calls between February and September 2024, with callers hiding their true identity and impersonating local crime and fire prevention initiatives to trick recipients. According to the ICO, one of TMAC’s directors admitted that the telephone numbers called were included in data acquired at a previous company.
Nuisance and scam calls are regulated not by the GDPR but by the Privacy and Electronic Communications Regulations, which require explicit consent to marketing calls to TPS registrants and mandate identifying callers and providing contact information.