Fullness of crossed products of factors by discrete groups

Let M be an arbitrary factor and $\sigma : \Gamma \curvearrowright M$ an action of a discrete group. In this paper, we study the fullness of the crossed product $M \rtimes _\sigma \Gamma $. When Γ is amenable, we obtain a complete characterization: the crossed product factor $M \rtimes _\sigma \Gamma $ is full if and only if M is full and the quotient map $\overline {\sigma } : \Gamma \rightarrow {\rm out}(M)$ has finite kernel and discrete image. This answers the question of Jones from [11]. When M is full and Γ is arbitrary, we give a sufficient condition for $M \rtimes _\sigma \Gamma $ to be full which generalizes both Jones' criterion and Choda's criterion. In particular, we show that if M is any full factor (possibly of type III) and Γ is a non-inner amenable group, then the crossed product $M \rtimes _\sigma \Gamma $ is full.