The Federal Antimonopoly service fined “MegaFon” for distribution of SMS advertising without the consent of the subscribers. This was reported on the Agency’s website.
The amount of the fine amounted to 200,000 rubles. The basis for the sanctions part 1 of article 18 of the Federal law “On advertising”. As the statement of the Antimonopoly service, the operator is held liable “for the distribution of advertising without the prior consent of the subscriber or addressee to receive advertising.” Management said that in order for advertising to MegaFon used SMS-mailing.
In early 2014 the state Duma adopted a law banning mailings of SMS-spam. For their implementation the operator shall first conclude an agreement with the client for the provision of such services. Moreover, in accordance with the law, in this contract should be written out data such as the volume, time distribution and its character. The contract also should specify the client’s right at any time to unsubscribe from this mailing list, or from a specific sender.
Note that this is not the first claim “the Megaphone” in recent years. In July, the mobile operator was fined 100 000 rubles for the advertising of the tariff plan “Go to zero”, and at the end of September — on the same amount for advertising tariff “MegaFon — All inclusive’s”. In both cases the operator was punished for the lack in the advertising rates of the essential information about the terms and cost of their shopping.
In March, FAS fined “MegaFon” for sending SMS spam to 300 000 rubles.
