In total, the potentially fraudulent activity may have resulted in about $1.4 million in misspending, according to federal investigators. The government sent that money directly to telecom carriers, which under law accept federal benefits on their subscribers’ behalf and apply the discounts to customers’ bills. None of the companies that processed the suspect applications and received federal funds are named in the report.
But the FCC’s inspector general on Thursday described the matter as a serious threat, one that if left unresolved could undermine the roughly $14 billion in subsidies Congress adopted last year. And its findings offered a stark reminder of the myriad problems that plagued its decades-old predecessor — an initiative to provide low-cost telephone service that had been riddled with fraud over the years.
The FCC did not immediately…
