Peter Cleere (Carlow-Kilkenny, Fianna Fail)
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216. To ask the Minister for Communications, Climate Action and Environment his plans to review the feasibility of implementing an SMS scam filter to assist in talking fraud, as outlined in the Programme for Government; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [9370/25]

Darragh O'Brien (Dublin Fingal East, Fianna Fail)
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My Department is committed to tackling scam calls and texts across electronic communications networks and services. The total quantifiable harm to Irish society arising from scam SMS is estimated at €115 million per annum. This damage is not solely endured by Irish citizens, but businesses too are paying a heavy price.

Both my Department and the Commission for Communications Regulation (ComReg), the statutorily independent regulator under the aegis of my Department, continue to explore and evaluate interventions to protect consumers from nuisance communications. This includes an ongoing evaluation of potential legislative solutions that would enable a broader application of SMS Filtering than currently available.

Meanwhile, ComReg established an industry action group to address the growing menace of scam calls and texts, the Nuisance Communication Industry Forum (NCIF). This cross-industry body builds on the work of the previous Nuisance Communications Industry Taskforce (NCIT), established in February 2022.

In April of 2024, having been informed by the submissions to its consultation in June 2023 and by the work of the NCIT, ComReg mandated six interventions. The interventions focus on restoring trust in Ireland’s telecommunications services by identifying and deploying interventions to decrease the prevalence and damaging effects of nuisance communications. These include:

- Do Not Originate (DNO) list: a list of numbers that will be blocked for call origination.

- Protected Numbers (PN): The blocking of numbers that have not been assigned by ComReg.

- Fixed – Calling Line Identification (CLI) Call Blocking: Identifies and blocks scam calls originating from international networks but presenting as an Irish landline caller.

- Mobile CLI Call Blocking: Identifies and blocks scam calls originating from international networks presenting as an Irish mobile caller.

- SMS Sender ID Registry: Allows businesses to register their Sender ID. Operators would then block any SMS message bearing a Sender ID from an unregistered source. The portal for SMS Aggregators and Mobile Service Providers opened at the beginning of February of this year, allowing them to pre-register their business customers’ existing SMS Sender IDs in bulk with ComReg.

- Voice-firewall: Software that identifies and blocks scam calls from Ireland or abroad and will help protect against future more sophisticated scams.

The NCIF will assist and oversee the implementation of ComReg’s Decision Instruments, mandating this package of interventions.

These interventions are at various stages of deployment and so the impact of these efforts will likely be enjoyed and recognised by the Irish consumer in a phased manner. Operators have already implemented a number of these measures to tackle nuisance communications, which have blocked around 30 million scam calls since 2023.