Podcast 38: Truth in Telecoms, Huzzah for the Czar

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Since I reposted Eric Troutman’s excellent review of The Campaign Registry’s response to Frederick (“Rick”) Joyce’s FCC filing on Thursday, where I linked the work we’ve been doing on the US messaging ecosystem. The repost reached 2.5k impressions overnight, my profile has been viewed over 100 times in 24 hours, and several people have reached out to commend the work as essential steps in exposing the truth to finally stop the SMS spam and robocalling in the US.

Late last night (Thursday) I received two documents anonymously. They appear to be the cover letter (redacted) and an email from one of the exhibits. I’ve confirmed with Johnny the documents are genuine. It’s part of a vast dossier sent to Tata Communications. Most redactions seem to cover specific personal information, names, or potentially sensitive information. The documents appear to be either public information or information related to illegal activity which can’t be protected by NDA.

Here’s the Cover Letter and CFIUS Submission, which confirms what Johnny has told me and on our podcasts. This is a complex story, at the end of this post I link to other posts that explain more background, The Messaging Monopolies Simplified is a good place to start to understand all the acronyms and different companies like DCA (Direct Carrier Aggregator), CSP (Campaign Service Providers), carriers, etc.

The cover letter goes beyond what was covered in the Complaint filed against Kaleyra in September 2023. Remember the complaint is sworn testimony from Bill, if any of it proves false, that’s perjury and Bill faces up to 5 years in prison plus additional fines and probation.

There’s several points I’d like to make from reading these documents:

1) T-Mobile is the carrier

Quoting from the complaint:

Mr. Peters was also made aware of discussions between a major carrier of wireless communications in the U.S. and Campaign Registry executives on their weekly calls indicating a plan to influence elections by ensuring that certain organizations did not have the same access to messaging. In particular, during one recorded call, Stefan Heller was discussing election influence with a representative of that carrier who specifically stated that they needed to restrict the “Project Veritas’ of the world.”
complaint Case 1:23-cv-01051-UNA Document 1 Filed 09/26/23

T-Mobile must conduct an investigation on the alleged election interference discussion between T-Mobile and TCR as a matter of utmost urgency. In reference to the cease and desist Tata sent as a New Year’s present, we never had the recordings. We know of their existence, I recommend T-Mobile discuss with TCR the location of those recordings.

2) Tata Communications has sat on this information since July 2023

Tata Communications has sat on this information since July 2023. I have advised Tata multiple times that they must urgently investigate what is going on at TCR. They potentially bought a fraudulent company, knowing it was fraudulent. I know that sounds odd.

3) Sinch is the DCA

I’ve pointed out several times there are many issues with the current TCR solution. For example, a DCA (Direct Carrier Access), a text messaging provider having direct connections/agreements with operator(s), can link a specific campaign to a number, and with that information raise complaints of spam for that number, and close down a campaign potentially without the campaign owner’s knowledge.

Here’s a real world example of that happening that was covered up by TCR management, quoting from the complaint.

“In September 2022, Campaign Registry operations personnel discovered election interference aimed at certain Republican campaigns and in particular, the Kari Lake campaign for Arizona Governor. In September of 2022, someone using the handle “Forum83” and the email address Forum83@yahoo.com was able to ultimately convince the companies delivering political messaging to Arizona to stop all Republican messaging for the state for a couple weeks in September of 2022. Forum83 claimed it was all spam and played on the lack of knowledge of support desk personnel. The company that shut down the messaging was based in Chicago, but the support desk person who shut off the messages for Arizona was a foreigner based in Australia. Forum83 also interfered with Republican campaigns in parts of California during October 2022. Mr. Peters learned all of this (and received the emails) from Ricardo Cavero (TCR Head of Operations). Mr. Cavero ended up dealing with Forum83 directly on a phone call, and that is how Mr. Peters discovered Forum83’s identity.”

“When Mr. Peters and others learned what was happening, Mr. Peters asked Mr. Cavero to report what he had learned to Campaign Registry management, specifically to Soren Schafft (TCR CEO), Tor Soevik (TCR COO), Stefan Heller (TCR VP Business Development) and Michael Ford (TCR VP Operations). They told Mr. Cavero to let it go and not do anything.”

“Mr. Peters reported this to the FBI through his attorney in September 2022 and by direct interview in Washington, DC on October 20, 2022.”
complaint Case 1:23-cv-01051-UNA Document 1 Filed 09/26/23

I was told by Johnny that the election interference came from a Sinch VP for North America. Sinch has been made aware.

Johnny and Avi

One aspect of the TCR story is the relationship between Johnny Tarone and Avi Katz (chairman Kaleyra at the time) who continued their discussion on a number of issues after the offer for TCR was rejected. Johnny has shared some of their SMS conversations with me.

Bill’s whistling-blowing highlighted many violations at Kaleyra. Bill’s role was still vacant, and Kaleyra needed help fast to resolve them. Johnny persuaded Bill based on Avi’s assurances to resolve the violations so he would get get paid for wrongful termination and paid to clean up the violations he exposed. However, Kaleyra persisted with a separation agreement requiring Bill not talk to the US government. Given Bill had already talked to the SEC, CFIUS, FBI and the NSA; that was not possible. Hence the current ongoing arbitration.

Tata used TCR data on the day of closing

I would like to remind everyone that when Tata Communications finalized the acquisition of Kaleyra they sent out a marketing campaign to some of TCR’s partners, on the day of closing, Oct 5 2023. This is in direct violation of the contract TCR signed with its customers that it operates independent of its owner, Tata Communications. I know several CSPs (Campaign Service Providers) were livid over this, as it showed customer information had been shared before closing.

Below is Podcast 38: Truth in Telecoms, Huzzah for the Czar. Its a solid review of what has happened to Bill Peters over the past years, and includes the additional information learned last night.

Tata Communications you are paying Littler to intimidate us. Johnny discovered a strange man talking to his 5 year old daughter while that man was delivering documents from Littler. At 8PM on a Saturday evening my family was subject to commanding rapping at the front door while watching the movie Nimona. I did not know Bill while he was employed at TCR, including me in the arbitration between Bill and TCR is yet more evidence of intimidation.

To both T-Mobile and Tata Communications, you need to investigate TCR as a matter of urgency. Sinch, you need to investigate the election interference committed by an employee, and close that hole in your processes. The overriding objective of Truth in Telecoms is to stop SMS spam and robocalling in the US. See John Oliver’s video on pig-butchering scams which often start with spam SMS.