DICT: SIM registration helped reduce scams

MANILA, Philippines — Since the SIM Card Registration Law was implemented, there has been a “significant” drop in phishing and scamming activities reported, according to the Department of Information and Communications Technology (DICT).

At yesterday’s plenary deliberations of DICT’s 2024 budget, the agency’s sponsor Makati Rep. Luis Campos Jr. said that the current average number of complaints received by DICT is 489.37 daily, a substantial drop from the 51,874 total reported text scams complaints from Sept. 12, 2022 to Dec. 26, 2022.

The lawmakers were assured that the agency is now reviewing the guidelines on SIM card registration to keep abreast with the new technologies in scamming.

Campos also defended the inclusion of the Philippine National Police and Armed Forces of the Philippines in the inter-agency committee on SIM card registration.

“Those agencies are stakeholders also because their particular area of concern would be national security. But their participation is not to dictate to us but only to be able to air out whatever concerns they may have,” he added.

Campos also said that in “isolated and disadvantaged areas, there is real danger for those implementing SIM card registration” so it is where the two law enforcement agencies come in.

“They are there just to ensure peace and order,” he said.