THE COMMERCE Ministry has dished out a record fine of €200,000 to a company roping consumers into subscribing to their SMS service at considerable cost.
A company called WIN A. E. lured people via free scratch cards to send a free message to numbers 6169 and 6116 to claim their prize, an announcement from the Commerce Ministry yesterday said.
Most people failed to read the fine print stating that they would also be subscribing to expensive bi-weekly SMS messages.
People got scammed out of hundreds of thousands euros which is why the company got such a hefty fine, the Cyprus Mail was told.
And because people signed up for a monthly subscription from April 9 onwards, they only got the bill at the end of May or beginning of June failing to realise for weeks they were being taken for a ride.
The Commerce Ministry received scores of consumer complaints which as one official said “represents a much larger number since most people who receive such messages will not actually file a complaint”.
The recipients of unsolicited messages will not be charged for them, CyTA’s Petros Charalambous said.
“ But if we respond to a message to enter a competition or say, receive some songs on our mobile phones… before doing that we must make sure we know how much it will cost,” Charalambous added.
He said that there were two ways the public could be scammed.
The first way is by answering the message once and getting a one-off charge or else calling a number with a high charge number.
But the real threat to people’s wallets comes from inadvertently subscribing to a service, such as the one just caught by the Commerce Ministry.
“We must make sure we fully understand the terms of service before responding,” Charalambous warned.
Those who do respond to four digit numbers may be giving consent to subscribe to services either by their mobile phone or by going online on the message’s recommendation, Charalambous warned.
The Commerce Ministry advises consumers to avoid online games and refrain from responding to expensive SMS messages, unless they clearly understand what they are getting themselves into.
A prime example dates back to April when thousands of people responded to ‘lonely Angela’ who told her friend ‘Aliki’ of her recent single status and loneliness and asked her out for coffee. More males than females were convinced ‘Angela’ was a real person, in need of company.
