Lawmakers on the Transportation Committee yesterday questioned the National Communications Commission’s (NCC) policy requiring two-way authorization when consumers make payments involving small sums of money over mobile devices, saying that it has proved to be ineffective in reducing fraud.
The two-way authorization system was established in response to reports of scams using text-messaging applications in recent years, which have resulted in financial losses for many customers.
According to the National Police Agency, hackers take advantage of Line and other text-messaging applications to distribute spam links, which contain Trojan horse viruses. Downloading data from the links can allow hackers to access personal information, including authorization numbers for purchasing mobile phone applications.
Hackers then use the stolen information to shop online and distribute fraudulent messages to a user’s lists of contacts.
Government statistics show that 272 cases of fraud were committed through text-messaging software last year, with financial losses of approximately NT$2.45 million (US$81,400). This year, the number of cases was 497 as of last month, with financial losses topping NT$3.15 million.
NCC Chairperson Howard Shyr (石世豪) said during his presentation that the function enabling small payments by customers can only be activated by users, adding that telecom carriers must not set the function to open without the customer’s authorization.
To make a micropayment, Shyr said the telecom carriers must send a text message requesting an authorization code and users must send a text message back to the carriers after they enter the code. The system should send another message to inform users that the authorization is complete, he said.
“If customers suffer losses because the carriers fail to set up this two-way authorization mechanism or because they preset the function as open, the loss must be covered by the carriers,” he said.
Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) Legislator Tsai Chi-chang (蔡其昌) questioned the effectiveness of the two-way authorization mechanism in curbing fraud.
“Hackers buy something online with the stolen information and ask the telecom carriers to allow for payment through a mobile device. Telecom carriers are supposed to send a message to the user requesting authorization. Because the hackers have ‘occupied’ users’ mobile phones through phishing messages, their mobile phones will automatically authorize such payment without the customer’s knowledge. Instead of a reduction in fraud, we are seeing a rise,” Tsai said.
Tsai added that the commission is considering improving the mechanism by requesting a code from customers to activate the function for making payments, which is similar to the method used when consumers authorize transactions by credit card.
DPP Legislator Yeh Yi-jin (葉宜津) said that the police agency has yet to solve a fraud committed via mobile messaging service Line because the messages sent over the application are encrypted, adding that because Line is an overseas firm, it is difficult to procure user information.
To avoid other possible issues generated by a two-way authorization mechanism, Yeh said that customers should be required to go to telecom carriers’ stores in person to activate the micro-payment function.
South Korean K-pop girl group Blackpink are to make Kaohsiung the first stop on their Asia tour when they perform at Kaohsiung National Stadium on Oct. 18 and 19, the event organizer said yesterday. The upcoming performances will also make Blackpink the first girl group ever to perform twice at the stadium. It will be the group’s third visit to Taiwan to stage a concert. The last time Blackpink held a concert in the city was in March 2023. Their first concert in Taiwan was on March 3, 2019, at NTSU Arena (Linkou Arena). The group’s 2022-2023 “Born Pink” tour set a
CPBL players, cheerleaders and officials pose at a news conference in Taipei yesterday announcing the upcoming All-Star Game. This year’s CPBL All-Star Weekend is to be held at the Taipei Dome on July 19 and 20.
The Taiwan High Court yesterday upheld a lower court’s decision that ruled in favor of former president Tsai Ing-wen (蔡英文) regarding the legitimacy of her doctoral degree. The issue surrounding Tsai’s academic credentials was raised by former political talk show host Dennis Peng (彭文正) in a Facebook post in June 2019, when Tsai was seeking re-election. Peng has repeatedly accused Tsai of never completing her doctoral dissertation to get a doctoral degree in law from the London School of Economics and Political Science (LSE) in 1984. He subsequently filed a declaratory action charging that
The Hualien Branch of the High Court today sentenced the main suspect in the 2021 fatal derailment of the Taroko Express to 12 years and six months in jail in the second trial of the suspect for his role in Taiwan’s deadliest train crash. Lee Yi-hsiang (李義祥), the driver of a crane truck that fell onto the tracks and which the the Taiwan Railways Administration's (TRA) train crashed into in an accident that killed 49 people and injured 200, was sentenced to seven years and 10 months in the first trial by the Hualien District Court in 2022. Hoa Van Hao, a
RSS