New anti-fraud system is labelling hospital texts and other legitimate messages as ‘likely scam’
Ireland’s new crackdown on scam texts is labelling real texts as fraudulent – leading to confusion over hospital appointments, digital verification codes and sports tickets. Patients of St James’s Hospital in Dublin are seeing “likely scam” on appointment texts from the institution, despite the hospital being signed up on a new verified register with the telecoms operator, ComReg. The Irish Independent has also seen similar “scam” labels newly applied to texts from smaller regional healthcare facilities, where patients are sometimes waiting for SMS confirmations for appointments made last year. Other large organisations, including VHI, the CAO, An Post, Amazon and Google, have also seen legitimate customer SMS messages in Ireland labelled as “likely scam”, despite also being registered on the verified senders list set up by ComReg. From October, such texts will be blocked entirely, leading to concern among medical patients and other service users about missed appointments. Last week, Ireland’s mobile operators began implementing a new system set up by ComReg, aimed at stopping fraudulent text messages. The system involves a register of verified organisations that used the “Sender ID” system when sending SMS messages to customers or individuals that show the organisation’s name instead of a mobile number. Any company or organisation which has not registered on ComReg’s list and which tries to use its brand name through the Sender ID system when sending an SMS text will see those texts labelled as “likely scam”. From October 3, such texts will be blocked altogether. In many reported cases of legitimate texts being flagged as potential scams, the labels are being attached to verification SMS messages. A spokesperson for ComReg said: “We are aware that some already registered Sender IDs are getting modified to ‘likely scam’. “ComReg is working with the mobile service providers and relevant parties to resolve this issue as soon as possible.” The Irish Independent has established that some registered companies’ texts are being labelled as “likely scam” because of reliance on unregistered third-party marketing or IT firms that handle campaigns, including SMS messaging. Bohemian Football Club in Dublin uses an unregistered Norwegian firm, TicketCo, for ticket sales. That means tickets purchased now receive confirmation texts with “likely scam” on them. ”I got one after I bought some Bohs match tickets,” wrote one fan on social media. “I deleted it immediately.” Video by Hannah Daygo Credit to : Irish Independent