A synthesised voice falls under a 1991 statute
The Federal Communications Commission adopted declaratory ruling FCC 24-17 on 2 February 2024 and released it on 8 February. The ruling confirms that the Telephone Consumer Protection Act of 1991 and its restrictions on an artificial or prerecorded voice encompass current technologies that generate human voices. Such a call therefore requires the prior express consent of the called party, absent an emergency purpose or an exemption.
Why it matters
No new rule appeared: the regulator said the old one already contained it. That is the cheapest way to close a gap -- not to wait for legislation but to read existing words so they reach a technology that did not exist in 1991. Two weeks after the New Hampshire calls, a synthesised voice acquired a legal status without a single new enactment.
The proceeding is CG Docket No. 23-362. Paragraph 11 orders that the ruling is effective upon release, that is on 8 February 2024. What the record does not claim. This is not a blanket ban: the ruling expressly preserves emergency purposes and exemptions, and the requirement bears on consent rather than on the technology. The word unanimous is not in the document; it is signed By the Commission with three commissioners issuing separate statements, so no unanimity is claimed here. The report gave docket 02-278 as a second proceeding; it appears once as a cross-reference, not as the proceeding in which the ruling was made.