Definition
An autodialer, or automatic telephone dialing system (ATDS), is equipment the TCPA defines as having the capacity to store or produce telephone numbers to be called using a random or sequential number generator, and to dial those numbers.
The definition matters because the TCPA's restrictions on calls to wireless numbers apply to calls made either with an ATDS or with an artificial or prerecorded voice. For years the FCC and the courts disagreed over whether equipment that simply dials numbers from a stored list counts. The D.C. Circuit set aside the FCC's broad 2015 interpretation in ACA International v. FCC (2018), and the federal appeals courts then split.
The Supreme Court resolved the split in Facebook, Inc. v. Duguid, decided unanimously on April 1, 2021. The Court held that a device qualifies as an ATDS only if it has the capacity either to store or to produce telephone numbers using a random or sequential number generator. Facebook's system, which sent login-alert texts to numbers stored in its database, did not qualify. After the ruling, equipment that only dials numbers from a stored list, such as a patient roster, generally falls outside the federal definition.
Duguid narrowed only one prong. Calls using an artificial or prerecorded voice, which since 2024 includes AI-generated voices, still need consent however the number was dialed, and Do Not Call rules are unaffected. Some states have also written broader definitions of automated dialing equipment into their own mini-TCPA laws, so the federal ruling does not settle the question everywhere.
How Consig handles it
Autodialer definitions are among the legal theories behind current TCPA litigation that an AI patient-calling program has to navigate on every call. Consig's compliance engine monitors changing regulations and enforces the relevant federal and state calling rules on each call.