Telecommunications company Melita came under fire by a concerned father for calling his 12-year-old daughter on her mobile phone and trying to sell her various products.

Andrew Farrugia was incensed for two reasons: the "irresponsibility" of the company to target minors and the fact that, despite not being a Melita subscriber, the company still managed to obtain his daughter's number.

"Where are they getting the numbers from? And what if the numbers fall in the hands of people who do not mean well?"

He called the company to lodge a complaint but, even though his call was taken, he never received a reply. All he was told was Melita had its particular system of obtaining people's numbers.

He said his other daughter, 17 and not a Melita subscriber, was also contacted by the company.

Mr Farrugia wondered whether a business transaction would have taken place if one of his daughters had accepted to buy a product.

"Who would have had to foot the bill," he asked, pointing out that this raised ethical and moral questions.

When contacted, Melita said it was not its policy to call minors because contracts could only be signed with those over 18 years of age.

However, "like all other telecom providers operating in Malta", Melita engages in telesales to promote and sell products, offers and services to the public.

The sales calls are made to existing Melita customers who choose to share their contact details with the company and "individuals who have their contact details listed on databases accessible to all".

"Therefore, by calling readily available numbers shared on public databases, such as telephone directories, Melita would have no information on the demographics of the recipient, such as age, gender or status," a company spokesman said.

In Mr Farrugia's case, Melita said it had no record of correspondence with him, so it could not comment about the particular case.

The company added that people could request to be on the "exclusion list" if they were not interested in receiving the latest company information. Children's Commissioner Carmen Zammit agreed that targeting minors for direct marketing should not be done because children were not legally empowered or mature enough to sign contracts or understand financial transactions.

She pointed out that broadcasting laws were very strict when it came to advertising to target children, and the same logic should apply.

Those involved in telesales should always make sure they spoke to the parents or guardians of the children they called, she argued.

However, Ms Zammit said the argument would be more complicated in the case of the 17-year-old, for instance, because children at that age might already be earning their keep and mature enough to understand what they were getting in to even though legally one had to be 18 to sign a contract.