Mobile phone spam is a form of spamming directed at the text messaging service of a mobile phone. It is described as mobile spamming, SMS spam, text spam, or SpaSMS but is most frequently referred to as m-spam.

As the popularity of mobile phones surged in the early 2000s, frequent users of text messaging began to see an increase in the number of unsolicited (and generally unwanted) commercial advertisements being sent to their telephones through text messaging. This can be particularly annoying for the recipient, because unlike email, it is usually difficult or impossible to delete an SMS message without reading it.

In addition, some wireless service providers, notably in the USA, charge a fee for every message received, including spam, placing users in the unenviable position of having to pay to receive unwanted spam on their mobile phones.

Some telecommunications providers believe that SMS spam is going to be the next big challenge as the fast development of technology allows SMS spam to be sent at relatively low cost using Internet SMS portals.

[edit] Criminality, Law Enforcement

SMS spam is illegal under common law in most jurisdictions as 'tresspass to chattel'.^[1] Jurisdictions with specific SMS spam regulation and fines include the US ^[2], Australia^[3], the EU and others; violators face substantial fines^[4].

[edit] Factors complicating SMS spam reduction

Fighting SMS spam is complicated by many factors, not the least of which is that most mobile phones have limited programmability and little if any capacity to run third-party spam-filtering software. Even were this not the case, however, filtering SMS spam at the recipient device level would be an imperfect solution in markets where users are charged to receive messages, as the user would still have to pay for the message once the provider sent it, even if software on the device blocked it from appearing on the device's display. This problem is not present in most of the world outside the U.S., however, as users are not charged to receive messages.

In addition, mobile phone providers in many jurisdictions are prohibited by law from blocking messages, including spam, that are sent to a telephone number. Even if message filtering is not explicitly forbidden, providers may be reluctant to assume the potential liability should a legitimate message of an emergency nature be blocked.

[edit] Countermeasures

There are, however, a few strategies that can help reduce SMS spam.

One of the most obvious SMS spam-reduction techniques is to guard one's cell phone number. One of the biggest sources of SMS spam is number harvesting carried out by Internet sites offering "free" ring tone downloads. In order to facilitate the downloads, users must provide their phones' numbers; which in turn are used to send frequent advertising messages to the phone. Wording in the sites' Terms of Service make this legal; and users may have to go as far as to change their cell phone numbers to stop the spam.

Another approach to reducing SMS spam that is offered by some carriers involves creating an alias address rather than using the cell phone's number as a text message address. Only messages sent to the alias are delivered; messages sent to the phone's number are discarded. In jurisdictions that forbid telecommunications providers from filtering SMS messages, the subscriber must specifically disable all text messages from being sent to the numerical address in order for the provider to be in compliance with the law.

Finally, most cell phone providers offer the option of completely disabling all text messaging services on a user's account. This extreme solution, however, is satisfactory only for those users who have neither the need nor the desire to utilize SMS at all.

[edit] See also

• Phone fraud
• Wangiri

[edit] References

[edit] External links

• how to block cellphone spam
• Clampdown on missed call scam, BBC News.
• SMS Spam hits Qatar.
• iDA Singapore :mTouche Fined $150,000.
• Phone Spammer List