Move to help prevent tech-related crimes
The National Broadcasting and Telecommunications Commission (NBTC) board has approved eight measures to prevent and suppress crimes related to technology.
They form guidelines for telecom operators and related parties to adopt to comply with the amended emergency decree on the prevention and suppression of cybercrime, which went into effect on April 13.
First, telecom operators must check and screen users who display unusual behaviour, immediately suspending their usage. Unusual behaviour may include making a lot of calls, the locations of calls and the devices used for calls (such as using a SIM card box).
Second, service operators must immediately suspend callers’ usage upon being notified by the NBTC that they are suspicious numbers. The mobile phone operators must suspend the service within 24 hours, while other related telecom operators must suspend the service within three days.
Third, the operators responsible for registering new customers must comply with the NBTC’s related rules.
This means these operators must recheck the information of customers registered from Jan 1, 2024 until the date these eight measures take effect. They must finish rechecking within 90 days after the announcement of these measures.
They must also finish rechecking the information of customers registered before 2024 within one year after the announcement of the measures.
Fourth, in the case of SMS sending from applications on the basis of application-to-person, operators are required to ask such applications to register the senders’ names with the operators first before they can send messages with attached links and the operators must always examine the links before they send them.
Fifth, the operators are bound by duty to limit the registration of SIM cards by foreigners to three per person/mobile service provider and require the use of passports to verify identity to register the SIM cards.
Sixth, the operators will have to limit the validity period of SIM cards of foreign tourists to no more than 60 days.
Foreigners will not be allowed to top up the call value to extend the service usage after the service expires. They will have to register to authenticate their ID with the operators again to renew the usage.
Seventh, the operators must not allow unauthorised SIM boxes with capacity to hold more than 4 SIM cards to connect to their telecom network.
Eighth, the operators must add the prefix numbers to overseas incoming call phone numbers to warn customers that they are recieving incoming calls from overseas.
According to NBTC commissioner Pol Gen Nathathorn Prousoontorn, mobile phone operators and other telecom service providers and related service providers will have to share responsibility for the damage if they cannot prove that they operated in compliance with these measures.
The measures are developed in line with Article 8/10 of the amended law on the prevention and suppression of technology-related crime.
The article requires mobile phone operators, telecom operators and financial institutes to share responsibility for the damage, except in cases where they can prove that they operated in compliance with the measures defined by the relevant sectoral regulators.
Article 4/1 of the same law requires sectoral regulators, including the NBTC, to issue such measures to guide the operators in their sectors regarding cybercrime.
The NBTC will announce these eight measures and they will take effect on the announcement.
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