This week new regulations from the CRTC came into effect requiring mobile phone providers to install new security software to protect their users from scam calls.
The software companies will be required to install offers protection from two types of phone scammers. First, it will block any calls from numbers longer than 15 digits (The CRTC notes a large portion of scam calls originate from these sources). It will also block calls from numbers that have characters that cannot be dialed.
This new software does not offer any protection from “spoofing” which can often be one of the most damaging types of scams. “Spoofing” is a term for when scammers hijack numbers from organizations like Revenue Canada or the RCMP in order to extract valuable personal information from victims.
The new regulations came into effect Thursday and the CRTC hopes Canadians will enjoy a marked decline in scammers calling them.
