While the rest of the planet is dealing with spam calls and emails, Germans are struggling with perhaps the quaintest of technological problems during the pandemic: fax spam.

1980's technology owners across Germany have made thousands of complaints about unsolicited faxes advertising rapid coronavirus tests and face masks, according to the Federal Network Agency responsible for the telecommunications industry.

Long after the advent of email and document scanners all but killed off the fax machine in most parts of the world, the technology lives on in Germany, where public officials, doctors and many offices will still send and receive important documents by fax.

Almost half (49%) of German companies still regularly use faxes, according to 2020 figures from digital industries association Bitkom, down from higher numbers in previous years.

More than 4,000 cases of coronavirus fax spam have been submitted to German officials since December 2020, while more than 26,000 spam faxes were registered in the whole year of 2020, according to a March 22 statement from the agency.

Officials have now set up a coronavirus fax spam complaints page and ordered that several numbers sending spam faxes for FFP2 face masks and rapid tests be disconnected.

Germany has specific laws on advertising via fax, which is illegal without the consent of the person receiving the ad.

”Fax advertising without prior express consent is unlawful,” Jochen Homann, President of the Federal Network Agency, said. “The situation during the pandemic has not changed anything about that.”

 - dpa