Text scams flourish despite NTC regulations

CEBU – Text scams continue to flourish despite the rules and regulations set by the National Telecommunications Commission (NTC) against them.

As of January this year, the NTC office in Region 7 (Central Visayas) had received 28 complaints from mobile phone subscribers who were victims of text scams.

Fe Bobilles, of the NTC-Region 7’s one-stop public assistance office, said the number of complaints has declined since last year when there were yet no regulations against text scams.

Last year, a mobile subscriber went to the NTC after he was victimized by a bogus message telling him he had won in a lottery.

The victim deposited P30,000 to the sender of the bogus message for him to be able to claim his "prize."

Some scammers ask for prepaid cards. One complainant said he was duped of six cards worth of load.

But even with the scams that continue to circulate among the more than 30 million mobile phone subscribers in the whole country, the NTC could only offer to block the Subscriber Identification Module (SIM) of the bogus message sender and advise subscribers to be wary of suspicious messages.

To find out whether the message is legitimate or a scam, Bobilles said the valid number for online games is only up to four digits.

She added that it is easy for the receiver to know if the message is a fraud especially when the intended victim wins a raffle without even joining it.

But Bobilles said the NTC is gathering data to strengthen its implementation against text scams.

In 2003, the Anti-Money Laundering Council said scammers pocketed more than P5 million from text scams.

Bobilles said scammers are hard to pursue because they use prepaid numbers which they can easily discard after committing the crime.

Text scammers are liable for swindling and estafa. And although bank secrecy laws forbid agencies to open bank accounts that are used in scams, Bobilles said the NTC will tie up with the Department of Trade and Industry, the Bangko Sentral ng Pilipinas and the Anti-Money Laundering Council to help the agency combat text scams. — Freeman News Service