SMS Spam and Phishing messages
What is Spam?
Spam can be classed as unsolicited messages, typically from senders who you do not know, but can be a familiar
sender who has been compromised by hackers.
What is Phishing?
Phishing is messages that request you contact them by opening a web link, replying or making contact via phone.
These senders are after your personal details and pretend to be a legitimate company. They are phishing for
personal information that helps identify you, bank account verification etc. Keep in mind that little bits of personal
information can build a complete profile about you and WILL be shared within the hacking community.
Do not
• Do not reply to any unsolicited SMS messages on your phone.
• Do not open any links contained in the SMS message.
• Do not try to phone the sender of the SMS message.
Reasons:
If you respond in any way to the sender on unsolicited SMS messages you are simply confirming that they
have reached a real person, this can lead to your phone number being distributed to many groups of hackers.
If you open a web link then this can also confirm your existence and provides them with more metadata such
as your ISP, computer used, operating system etc.
What can I do to report Spam and Phishing SMS
We recommend that you forward all unsolicited SMS messages to the Australian Communications and Media Authority
(ACMA). Sending these spam and phishing SMS messages allows them to be investigated and benefits everyone in
attempting to reduce such occurrences.
How do I forward these SMS messages?
We suggest that you create a new phone contact on your phone for the ACMA. This will allow you to quickly
forward\report spam and phishing SMS messages. Once forwarded you will receive a confirmation SMS from the
ACMA.
Adding a phone contact:
Contact Name: ACMA SMS Spam Reporting
Phone: +61 429 999 888
Block the spammers phone number
Where your phone has the ability to block phone numbers then we recommend that you block the spammers phone
number.
Reporting the Spam or Phishing SMS message
Now that you have created the ACMA contact on your phone you can simply forward the Spam SMS message directly
to the ACMA. After a few minutes, you will receive confirmation from the ACMA. Please take care only to send
unsolicited, spam and phishing SMS messages to the ACMA reporting contact.
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