Crackdown vs text blasters up

The Department of Information and Communications Technology, or DICT, is cracking down on fraudsters who use cheap, China-made text-blasting machines to boost the electoral campaigns of their clients.

DICT Undersecretary Alex Ramos said they will clamp down on the proliferation of scam and spam messages plaguing users despite the SIM Registration Act being in place. It will also be timely as the barangay and youth elections are near, he added.

Ramos recalled that government authorities had previously confiscated text blast machines used to send messages en masse to multiple mobile numbers.

"Those text machines were very popular during campaign periods and they are now very cheap. We [have] seized a lot of these machines," he said.

Despite having a SIM law, fraudsters are still able to find new ways to hack into phones and computers, this time using over-the-top or OTT media services such as chat apps, which are outside the scope of telco filters.

The DICT official urged consumers to be more proactive and not fall for various online ruses by malevolent players capitalizing on the increasing shift by people to a digital lifestyle.

Cybercriminals use the target's full name and pretend to be messaging them about a missed connection or make various offers. They create a sense of familiarity and trust in an attempt to start a conversation.

The SIM Registration Act was envisioned to address escalating cybercrime in the country, including the proliferation of smishing and other forms of scam and spam messaging.

The law mandated all mobile phone and prepaid broadband users to register their SIMs by 25 July or face SIM deactivation.

A deactivated SIM card can potentially affect several aspects of a person's life. For instance, it will cut their access to online banking, e-commerce, transportation, healthcare, education, and entertainment, among other things.