The telecoms regulator will collaborate with government sectors and invite public service organizations to join the SMS Sender Registration Scheme to combat fraudulent messages and scam, said director-general of communications Chaucer Leung Chung-yin.
Under the scheme, senders are required by the Office of the Communications Authority to utilize registered SMS identities prefixed with "#" when sending text messages to mobile subscribers.
Initially launched with the telecoms sector, the scheme will expand its scope to include the banking sector.
Leung said that more government departments are expected to join, with the police and the Immigration Department already in and the Efficiency Office showing interest.
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To further bolster effectiveness, it plans to open registration to other organizations next month so as to create a collaborative effort involving multiple sectors.
Meanwhile, a working group set up by OFCA, the police and telecoms operators intercepted more than 2,400 suspected fraudulent calls and 6,800 fraudulent websites by year-end.
As regards the requirement for telecom operators to block calls from outside Hong Kong with the "+852" prefix since April, 2.1 million calls had been blocked and more than 22 million voice or text message alerts sent out by year-end.
With full implementation of the real-name registration system for SIM cards since February, 1.02 million SIM cards have been rejected for registration for failure to provide the required information.
Some 1.16 million cards have been deregistered after random checks.
About 510,000 mobile numbers have also been suspended since telecoms began monitoring and identifying suspected fraudulent calls in June.
Citing police statistics, Leung said the number of phone fraud cases fell 30 percent from a monthly average of 381 in the fourth quarter of 2022 to 272 in the first 11 months of 2023.
"The number of intercepted calls and deregistered phone numbers have also dropped in the past two months," Leung said.
But as fraudsters will employ many different tricks, he said the working group will hold regular meetings to discuss new measures and work with political parties and district councilors to educate the public on ways to combat fraud.