Some national coverage of this [npr.org]. It has been going on for a long time now, but under the confidentiality agreement with MCI, operators can't talk about it. I have worked as an IP-relay operator twice -- once for a year and again for 6 months. It is the most degrading, humiliating, soul-sucking job on earth. You get paid to be abused verbally (you can't possibly understand what hell operators are put through without experiencing it), and to scam mom & pop stores out of thousands of dollars for Nigerians. And operators are powerless to even talk about it. I'm glad people are finally speaking up.

MCI is scamming the FCC (and that means scamming your dollars)out of relay money used to make phone communication possible for the deaf. It's a load of crap and needs to stop. A link from that site [stoprelayabuse.com] has good info about what's going on.

Unlikely but: if by some chance another news service picks up this story and finds this post, I would be happy to give an interview. Please contact me personally off-site.

P.S. Thanks for the link, sqook!