The Congressional Record is a unique source of public documentation. It started in 1873, documenting nearly all the major and minor policies being discussed and debated.
“THE CELLULAR PROTECTION ACT OF 1997” mentioning the U.S. Dept. of Justice was published in the Extensions of Remarks section on pages E1733 on Sept. 11, 1997.
The publication is reproduced in full below:
THE CELLULAR PROTECTION ACT OF 1997
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HON. SAM JOHNSON
of texas
in the house of representatives
Thursday, September 11, 1997
Mr. SAM JOHNSON of Texas. Mr. Speaker, I would like to take this opportunity to introduce the Cellular Protection Act of 1997. This bill takes a serious step forward in helping our law enforcement combat a growing type of crime, cellular cloning.
For those who are not familiar with cellular cloning, the process is simple. It usually involves criminals seated in parked cars outside of airports or along busy roadways to harvest electronic serial numbers
[ESN's] from legitimate cell phone users. Special software and equipment are used to insert the stolen numbers into other cell phones, the clones. The cloned phones charge their calls to the account of the lawful, unsuspecting user. Like me. For instance, my phone was cloned while coming out of Dallas/Fort Worth Airport. I was faced with over
$6,000 in illegal charges on my bill.
As you may know, it is estimated that the cellular industry lost $650 million due to fraud in 1995, much of it as a result of cloning fraud. I have talked with many people in the telecommunications industry about this problem. My district is home to the largest concentration of telecommunications companies in the Nation.
The Secret Service has doubled the number of arrests in the area of wireless telecommunications fraud every year since 1991, with 800 individuals charged for their part in the cloning of cellular phones last year.
The sad thing is they probably could have caught a lot more of them. However, current law requires prosecutors to prove that a cloner acted with the intent to defraud. The Cellular Telephone Protection Act of 1997, removes this burden.
This legislation clarifies, that--except for law enforcement and telecommunications carriers--there is no lawful purpose for which to possess, produce, or sell hardware or software configured for cloning a wireless telephone or its ESN.
This is good commonsense legislation that is supported on both sides of the aisle, the Department of Justice, U.S. Secret Service, and the wireless industry.
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