If you’ve ever received an SMS scam text message, deciphering whether it’s legitimate or not can be difficult and time-consuming.
And if you’ve fallen for a scam text before — which often looks like a convincing message from the bank, post office, or government — then you may even be at a financial loss.
But new legislation introduced in federal parliament is promising to disrupt scammer text messages before they reach their targets.
The Australian Communications and Media Authority (ACMA) has been given the go-ahead to establish and run an SMS Sender ID Register, allowing telcos to check whether messages are sent under a brand name that matches a legitimate sender.
Sender IDs identify for a consumer who has sent the text message.
If found to be fraudulent, the SMS would be blocked or include a warning for headers that do not match.
But it’s still early days.
The government will now consider whether the registry should be mandatory for all entities that use a sender ID to contact Australian consumers.
This comes after a 37 per cent increase in SMS scams was reported last year compared to 2022, when almost two-thirds of the population were exposed to a scam attempt.
And SMS was reported as the most used method by scammers in 2022, causing $26.9 million in consumer losses.
During a pilot launch of the Sender ID Registry by ACMA last year, based on a voluntary model, selected brands were able to choose whether or not to register their sender IDs.
SMS texts using sender IDs were blocked, unless sent by an authorised party.
But SMS texts using an unregistered sender ID were not blocked, and could still be sent and received.
This showed that if an entity was not registered, it was possible that scam text messages could still be sent.
Push for mandatory registry
After the pilot, the government began seeking feedback on whether it should be made mandatory to register or not.
Results showed 89 per cent of those who participated favoured a mandatory register.
The Australian Communications Consumer Action Network (ACCAN) has also been calling for registration to be mandatory and underpinned by a robust compliance framework.
The ACCAN acting CEO Gareth Downing said the introduction of an SMS Sender ID Register is a crucial step to improving outcomes for telecommunications consumers impacted by scams.
International experience of the effectiveness of mandatory registers has also shown promise.
According to an ACCC report, Singapore saw a 64 per cent decline in scam SMS messages with mandatory registers.
“We encourage government to go a step further, taking heed of overwhelming feedback during the consultation process to make the Register mandatory to enhance its effectiveness,” ACCAN’s Dr Downing said.
“The Register will facilitate greater confidence between the senders and recipients of SMS communications — benefiting consumers, small businesses and service providers.”
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