CICC planning to file raps vs some telco firms

The Cybercrime Investigation and Coordinating Center (CICC) is mulling filing charges against some telecommunications companies and their free agents as thousands of unregistered SIM cards are being used by organized crime syndicates.

The CICC said organized crime syndicates are able to send out text messages with dangerous links for scams, according to a report on GMA Integrated News Bulletin on Saturday.

“When you have registered sim cards, you have registered names. But a lot of times we see some of the sim cards, walang (no) registered names or even sa (in the) database ng (of the) telco, they remain — supposed to be inactive — and yet they are operational,” CICC Executive Director  Alexander Ramos said in a report on GMA’s “24 Oras Weekend” on Sunday.

“We have to find the answers so that we will see if somebody’s accountable or is there a glitch or is there a need to improve the regulation,” he added.

The agency said there may have been entities that fraudulently registered sim cards during the first batch of registration when the security measures were relaxed.

It added that it will meet with the National Telecommunications Commission (NTC) to discuss the results of its investigation.

Senator Joel Villanueva earlier this month urged the Senate to investigate the "unprecedented number" of gambling-related text scams and the use, sale and importation of cell site simulators to send fraudulent text messages.

The lawmaker filed proposed Senate Resolution 1057 as he noted the significant number of SIM cards recovered in the previous raids against Philippine Offshore Gaming Operators (POGO) hubs.

The SIM Registration Act was signed by President Ferdinand "Bongbong" Marcos Jr. in October 2022 in a bid to reduce, if not eliminate, scams perpetrated through text or online messages.

The NTC has vowed to address the concerns on POGO-related scamming activities as it admitted that the SIM Registration Law, which it said is not a "silver bullet" against messaging scams, continues to face several challenges in its implementation.

GMA Integrated News is reaching out to telecommunications firms for comment on the matter. —KG, GMA Integrated News