Globe deactivates over 14,000 SIM cards found to be sources of text scams

Globe Telecom Inc said it has deactivated over 14,000 SIM cards found to be sources of spam and scam text messages.

The telco giant said in a press release on Monday, March 5 that it deactivated 14,013 SIM cards, which turned out to be sources of spam text messages. Using a filtering function and blocking mechanism, Globe said it also blocked over 400 million spam SMS messages in 2017.

“Text spamming is an industry-wide issue, and we acknowledge that Globe Telecom’s anti-spam campaign will not be as effective without the help of our customers. We encourage our customers to be vigilant and report any text scam they receive,” Anton Bonifacio, Globe Chief Information Security Officer, said in a statement.

Globe established its anti-spam solution and blocking mechanism in 2014, which consisted of a new hardware and software solution that can filter up to one billion SMS a day. Globe said this mechanism enabled the company to prevent the transmittal of spam/scam messages which have been sent through the Globe network. The following year, the mechanism was upgraded and expanded to effectively prevent spam-scam messages coming from other networks.

Globe added it has lowered the spam attempts, from 2.9 million daily spam traffic in 2016 to 182,000 in 2017. “This represents a 94% success rate. In addition, the number of spam call complaints has been reduced to 1,085, which is 65% lower from 3,073 total calls accumulated from 2014 to 2016.”