Petition · past parliament
Stop once and for all unsolicited SMS fraud in the UK
Closed
30 signatures
What the petition asks
Shady companies are sending fraudulent unsolicited premium rate SMS text messages to mobile phone owners in the UK. These cost recipients up to £4.50 a message often resulting in huge bills to the victim as the fraud is likely to go unnoticed for long periods of time.
Find a detailed description of the issue here:
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-3580058/Thousands-hit-4-50-time-scam-Customers-facing-bills-hundreds-pounds-texts-advertising-gaming-services-pornographic-content.html
This petition posits it should be a legal requirement for phone carriers to:
Not allow these services be activated on a customer’s account unless they have explicitly requested so (e.g. a representative of the carrier calls the customer to confirm activation of this service was indeed requested). If a carrier does not have this framework in place, they should not be allowed to operate premium SMS services at all.
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-3580058/Thousands-hit-4-50-time-scam-Customers-facing-bills-hundreds-pounds-texts-advertising-gaming-services-pornographic-content.html
This petition posits it should be a legal requirement for phone carriers to:
Not allow these services be activated on a customer’s account unless they have explicitly requested so (e.g. a representative of the carrier calls the customer to confirm activation of this service was indeed requested). If a carrier does not have this framework in place, they should not be allowed to operate premium SMS services at all.
Timeline
| 14 Feb 2018 | Petition opened for signatures |
| 14 Aug 2018 | Closed to new signatures |
Key facts
Signatures
30
Status
Closed
Opened
14 Feb 2018
Closed
14 Aug 2018
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Source: the official petition page. Last checked 15 Jul 2026.