Anonymous spam via advertising SMS might be on its last legs, thanks to new rulings from Agcom.
More and more often, people find themselves receiving advertising SMS on their mobile numbers, without knowing which sender is contacting them.
In fact, companies and individuals sometimes use a text alias that appears in the “sender” field, so that at first glance, the mobile number used for sending cannot be traced.
This system is also often adopted by those who send promotional SMS using specialized professional services, for example, those offered by specific online portals for “mass” mailings.
In order to regulate the matter, trying to limit the spam received by unsuspecting consumers, Agcom has made a resolution in this regard, introducing new rules that operators and companies must adhere to.
The reception of these advertising SMS, in the best-case scenario, can only be annoying, as it’s impossible to tell which number they came from.
In the worst case, however, this spam can contain pitfalls: for example, you might receive SMS from a fake sender impersonating communication from your bank or credit card issuer, requesting a reply with sensitive data.
Agcom has therefore issued resolution 42/13/CIR, which came into effect last October 16th.
Every company wishing to send promotional SMS will have the obligation to provide Agcom with the chosen alias in advance.
Individuals, on the other hand, will not be allowed to send SMS with aliases at all, and in general, aliases that could suggest the message originated from public institutions or entities should not be used.
Some professional providers of this type of SMS service are already moving accordingly: for example, Futureland.it has announced that it has already introduced the option to handle all Agcom filing procedures, at no extra cost to clients.
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