Government is still trying to fight the illegal telephone call-back service -- but admits it is powerless to stop residents using the Internet to access the service.

Minister of Telecommunications and E-commerce Renee Webb, in a reply to questions from Opposition Leader Pamela Gordon, said that the Government was doing all it could to police the situation.

But it appears there is little that the Government or the Ministry of Telecommunications can do to force the providers to stop.

Earlier this month the Minister revealed the Government was clamping down on the illegal call-back services which offer cheap long distance calls from Bermuda. Ms Gordon had asked Ms Webb how the Telecommunications Commission planned on policing the call-back service over the Internet.

In her reply Ms Webb said: "Call-back service over the Internet is difficult to police. It requires the cooperation of all the carriers. One has to ensure that the business number is legitimately used for business, plus the Internet Service Provider has to monitor the numbers.

"Basically, the policing has to be done by the industry, as the department has no way of controlling Internet calls unless it receives a telephone number from someone.'' Ms Webb said, however, that more progress was being made with the normal call back service.

She said: "Regular call-back service is easier to detect by the carriers.

They are now developing programmes to search for call-back. The department has written to the FCC (Federal Communications Commission) to add Bermuda to the list of countries that do not allow call-back. Plus we have recently written to two US companies to discontinue providing call-back service.

Ms Webb said on June 8 she had been in contact with two out of the three suppliers to halt the process and was about to tackle the third provider, who had a Bermuda agent.

Call-back service The illegal providers are believed to be Fiber Tel, Global Tel and Call Save.

She said that two American-based companies each had 788 and 852 clients. The number of clients on the third is not known.

She warned Bermudians that call-back services were illegal on the Island, but added that it was a difficult crime to detect.

The Minister made the call at the beginning of the month when she announced the Government was to allow Island companies to offer Internet telephone access.

Ms Webb said she thought the measures would see the cost of Internet access fall as more players are allowed on to the market.

Government said it hoped more competition would lead eventually to cheaper Internet access for everybody.

Ms Webb said a change to the telecommunications laws would benefit both the consumer and Bermuda.