EINA! Don't let those SMS sharks bite you!
Businesses won’t profit from social media platforms if they can’t protect their customers
SELDOM does a day go by without someone e-mailing me in an attempt to scam me.
This week I was offered a loan, a bank rewards payout (I’m not a client), and thousands of rands in store vouchers in return for completing a customer survey.
Many of these rogues are smart, and when they’re abusing the name of a genuine supplier they use e-mails and website addresses that look real — including legitimate logos, registration numbers, addresses, and even the mandatory fraud warning.
Fake SMSes are sometimes equally difficult to recognise. With so much legitimate commerce done through messaging these days, it’s hard to spot a trap. Especially in the dead of night, when you’ve just been woken and are unlikely to immediately recall that under the Consumer Protection Act companies are not allowed to market to consumers between 8pm and 8am, on Saturdays before 9am and after 1pm or on Sundays or public holidays.
When Cape Town reader Ahziza Isaacs received two SMSes in two days last week — both before dawn — offering her a loan, she took umbrage.
The clinical training specialist at a hospital in the city fired off an e-mail to “Blue Finance Loans” in which she described herself as a hard worker and complained she had lost two hours of rest because of the SMSes.
“So please in future do not send any SMS at the ungodly hour because I will take this further and report it. Awaiting an apology. Thanks,” Isaacs wrote.
The response shocked her: “So who fault is f**k you my man dont be a physco .whats wrong with u .hard working mxm.”
After a second e-mail by Isaacs elicited similar abuse, she asked me to investigate and I set about to confirm my suspicion that con men were using the name of registered credit provider Blue Financial Services, which used to offer consumer loans.
The numbers used with the SMSes were “unavailable”. The domain name linked to the .com e-mail address came back blank. And when I e-mailed, I received an unintelligible reply ending with “nhaa so no comment”.
The messages had not been sent by any member of the Wireless Application Service Providers’ Association or the Internet Service Providers’ Association, so there was no way of identifying the perpetrator through that route. The SMS was sent from a prepaid MTN number.
“In cases like these, we recommend that the recipient contact their network operator to report the unsolicited messages and provide the cell number sending the messages to ascertain if that cell number is being used inappropriately,” said James McNab, a member of Waspa’s management committee.
MTN said mobile operators were not permitted to scrutinise the contents of customers’ SMSs so were not able to tell if they’d been sent “for nefarious purposes”. It said if Isaacs felt harassed, she had the option of approaching her local magistrate’s court for an order to direct the network operator to release the identity of the sender and request a police investigation. Alternatively, it said Isaacs could block the numbers from her handset.
Another hoax campaign doing the rounds — myself and several colleagues were targeted again this week — is a so-called customer survey being conducted by Woolworths, which circulates largely via WhatsApp, Twitter and Facebook.
There are several versions of the “survey”, the latest being a request to complete it, share the link with 10 people and provide personal details, in return for a R6 500 store voucher.
Another version, as shown on the retailer’s website, includes a competition to win a voucher with a R7 a day subscription in tiny print under the box where the cell number is entered.
Again, neither Waspa nor the ISPA can help identify the perpetrator as the sender is not a member of either body.
“This is a scam and should be disregarded,” said Woolworths spokeswoman Kirsten Hewett this week.
In June Woolworths placed a warning on its website (albeit hidden behind a “news/press” link at the bottom of its homepage so consumers could be forgiven for missing it) referring to the “hoax customer satisfaction surveys and voucher competitions” as not being authorised.
The warning says the retailer would never request details via e-mail or SMS and such scams should be deleted.
It also offers customers advice on how to unsubscribe from any mobile service they may have been subscribed to.
Hewett said: “From a social media perspective, we track scam complaints and escalate them immediately to our social customer care team which responds to every social mention we can find with an explanation and the link to the caution on our website.”
But I had tweeted consumer warnings regarding the survey scam twice in the past few months, and Woolworths had done nothing but “like” my tweet. Why was the retailer not using its marketing channels to proactively warn customers of the scam, I asked.
A few days later, Woolworths sent out SMS, Twitter and other social media warnings. It also retweeted mine. Better late than never, I suppose.
Electronic communications legal expert Dominic Cull said: “Practically, your best option in many cases is simply to delete the offending SMS or e-mail without taking any further action.”
Consumers were generally unable to distinguish between scams and the large number of genuine promotions targeting them through social media and other channels, he said.
“Most of these genuine promotions require a participant to provide some personal information — a mobile or ID number — so it is tricky to know when this can be safely done. Certainly, however, you should not be submitting this information through e-mail.”
Cull said retail brands that regularly engaged in online promotions should take greater care of their customers, particularly when they knew of a specific scam targeting their customers.
“The brand should actively engage with its customers to warn them. A notice on a website is not sufficient and brands should use the channels through which customers are being exposed to the scam,” said Cull.
“Brands appear to be enthusiastic about sending direct marketing by SMS to customers but less enthused about sending their customers SMS-based warnings about fraud.”
Cull said that if scams of this nature were allowed to proliferate, there would be no space left for legitimate promotions.
That’s enough to scare the pants off any business.
Tune in to Power 98.7’s “Power Breakfast” (DStv audio channel 889) at 8.50am tomorrow to hear more from Megan
Brands are less enthused about sending their customers SMS-based warnings about fraud