SMART Communications Inc. has seen a significant decline in the number of reported text scams and spam messages in July with the upgrade of its cyber network.
With the new and advance firewall, Smart said it was able to block around 30 million malicious texts in a day, that led to a notable decline in the number of text scams reported by customers in July.
Smart said it continues to enhance the security features of its short message service (SMS) platform to further curb mobile technology-aided phishing activities.
“The new firewall blocks malicious text messages from being sent using the network. This also covers the full cycle of blocking SMShing messages, from both the sending and receiving ends,” said Jojo Gendrano, PLDT and Smart chief information security officer.
Smart said this new tool builds on its existing solution that protects customers from receiving malicious text messages.
From January to July this year, Smart has prevented more than a billion SMShing messages from reaching customers. Some 770,000 mobile numbers involved in illicit activities have also been blocked from its network for the same period.
Complementing this new network security solution is PLDT and Smart’s domain blocking capability that is integrated into the group’s cybersecurity infrastructure.
In June alone, the PLDT group has blocked more than 20 billion attempts to open malicious domains. The blocking tool has also amassed nearly five million domains with malicious URLS tied to phishing, spam and other fraudulent activities.
Smart said it has expanded its playbook to combat phishing attacks over SMS. Alongside the upgrade of its cybersecurity tools, it also urges customers to #BeCyberSmart by sharing tips on spotting SMShing messages.
