Payments using digital cash are on the rise in the Philippines. Amid a rise in texting scams, a measure requiring the registration of all postpaid and prepaid mobile phone subscriber identity module (SIM) cards hurdled committee level at the House of Representatives on September 5, 2022.
Highlights
- Rise in text-message scams that bear personal information of receivers bring the effects of SIM-card non-registration regime in the Asian country to a higher level.
- Philippine central bank reported 2,324% spike in hacking, malware attacks.
Manila: Authorities here have launched a probe into text-message scams that bear personal information of receivers — in attacks that bring the effects of SIM-card non-registration regime in the Asian country to a higher level.
Initial findings show the criminals behind such texting attacks may have bought data from a number of establishments. In the absence of an enabling law, users are not required to register dime-a-dozen SIM cards (pre-paid and post-paid) in the Philippines, a country rife with texting scams.
“We believe that the recent ‘smishing’ attacks are being perpetrated by local operators," PLDT Inc. Chief Information Security Officer Angel Redoble said in a media statement on Tuesday.
Names harvested: PLDT
Incumbent operator Philippine Long Distance Telephone Co (PLDT), said it had teamed up with police and government investigators to track down the people behind the scams.
The company suspects an electronic wallet, a messaging platform and mobile loan applications may have been used to harvest names.
Globe: measures taken
Globe Telecom Inc. said in a separate statement that it has stringent measures in place to bar third-party breaches and guard against scammers. The nation's privacy body said last week that it's also investigating the unsolicited text messages.
Philippines: 5,000% rise in digital payments
Digital payments have risen 5,000% in the the Philippines due to the pandemic, accounting for almost a third of retail transactions even as monetary authorities aims to get half of the nation's retail payments done digitally by end-2023.
Unregistered SIM cards have become the scourge of online trade in the Philippines, through scams driven by the anonymity of mobile phone numbers. But it's just one of the enablers of financial fraud in the Asian country. A law requiring subscribers to register their phone SIM cards has repeatedly failed to pass the legislative chambers.
Between 2019 to 2021, Filipinos have lost an estimated 2 billion pesos (about $40 million) to online fraudsters, according to a senior Philippine central bank official.
Bangko Sentral ng Pilipinas (BSP) Governor Benjamin Diokno said the shift to digital payments and online banking amid the pandemic saw a spike in cybercriminal activity.
The data came from consumer complaints noted by the BSP in the last two years from 2019 to 2021 — which shows financial transactions valued at Php 2 billion involved in scams, hacking and phishing attacks, said Diokno. The Philippine central bank has been cracking the whip against fraud, money laundering, but a new legislation is being considered in the Senate to better protect consumers of financial services.
2,324% surge in hacking, malware attacks
In 2020, hacking and other malware attacks surged by a whopping 2,324% from the previous year, while phishing and other social engineering schemes increased 302% from 2019. Over the same period, account takeover or identity theft rose 2.5%.