National Regulatory Agency for Electronic Communications and Information Technology of the Republic of Moldova

The National Regulatory Agency for Electronic Communications and Information Technology (ANRCETI) issued a notification for mobile providers, recommending that measures need to be taken to protect users against attempts to be cheated by swindlers via mobile phone. The recommendation came after the regulator found, according to the information offered by providers, that in April and May there was a significant increase in the number of complaints from users claiming that they were cheated and deprived of money or minutes from their mobile accounts, after they responded to requests to call unknown international numbers, received by SMS from unknown individuals.

According to the authors of the complaints, the swindlers send SMS from unknown numbers that appear to be sent from close people. For example, "Please, can call me, I have something important to tell you," "Call me, I have something urgent to tell you", "Hey, call me immediately", etc.. Those who fell into this trap and called those numbers were charged for international calls, wasting the money or credit (minutes) from their account. This type of fraud (via SMS and the "beep") exists in many countries. As many citizens of Moldova are living or working abroad, the users who receive such messages or calls naturally believe that they come from their friends or relatives from aboard. For this reason, the rate of responses to such messages or calls, according to estimations by a mobile provider, comes to 40%.

To reduce the rate of responses to fraudulent SMS, ANRCETI recommended providers to warn their customers about the risks induced by this type of fraud, by means of an information campaign through SMS, by posting warning messages on the front page of their Web sites, by making available free phone lines open for consultation, exchange of information on suspicious international numbers and to examine the possibility of promptly blocking the access to these numbers.

In order to monitor the situation, ANRCETI asked the three mobile providers (JSC "Orange Moldova", JSC "Moldcell" and JSC "Moldtelecom") to quarterly submit, as of the second quarter of this year, detailed statistical information on users’ complaints on this issue, the rate of responses to the fraudulent SMS and the actions they take to counter the attempts to cheat mobile users.

ANRCETI also warns mobile users who are receiving such messages to ignore, while if they need clarification, to call "green" phone line of ANRCETI - 080080080, for the needed inquiries. The call to this number is free of charge from anywhere in the country, available on weekdays between 8.00 and 17.00.

This method of communication between ANRCETI and users is one of the elements of the information campaign "Know your rights as an electronic communications service consumer", launched by the regulator in February 2014.

May 21, 2014