December 24, 2019 Results of Appeal for Opinions on Draft Report of WG on the Verification of the Consumer Protection Rules of Telecommunications Services and Announcement of Finalized Report

The Ministry of Internal Affairs and Communications (MIC) made an appeal for opinions from Thursday, November 14 through Monday, December 12, 2019, on a draft report compiled by the working group (WG) on the verification of the consumer protection rules of telecommunications services (Chief Investigator: Ikufumi Niimi, Professor Emeritus at Meiji University).
With consideration of the result of the appeal for opinions, the report was finalized, and MIC has decided to open it to the public.

Background

The current consumer protection rules have been enhanced and reinforced as a result of the 2015 amendment of the Telecommunications Business Act. With consideration of the diversification and complexity of telecommunication services and the current state of consumer troubles, the WG on the verification of the consumer protection rules of telecommunications services (Chief Investigator: Ikufumi Niimi, Professor Emeritus, School of Law at Meiji University) has been studying the ideal state of consumer protection rules for the future since October 2018 to verify the enforcement situation and effect of the rules. In April 2019, the WG compiled an interim report on the issues to be addressed from the perspective of further enhancing the consumer protection rules in the telecommunications business field.
After the compilation of the interim report, the WG made interviews and further discussions on the status of initiatives of related businesses and trade associations and compiled the contents into a draft report (draft) in a form added to the contents of the interim report. MIC made an appeal for opinions from Thursday, November 14 through Monday, December 2, 2019, on the draft report, and as a result, MIC received 14 opinions.
With consideration of the opinions and the result of the discussion of the WG at its 20th meeting (held on Tuesday, December 24, 2019), the report was finalized, and MIC has decided to open the report to the public.