Smart prods Dito to enhance measures vs fraudulent calls

MANILA, Philippines — Smart Communications Inc. will only approve the request of Dennis Uy’s Dito Telecommunity Corp. for additional interconnection capacity if it agrees to bolster its measures to detect fraudulent calls.

In a disclosure to the Philippine Stock Exchange, the wireless subsidiary of PLDT Inc. said it has yet to receive a copy of the antitrust charges that Dito filed before the Philippine Competition Commission (PCC) against the telco giants.

Smart said that it complies with the provisions of the competition law and has never engaged in anti-competitive practices as alleged by Dito.

According to Smart, Dito has requested for additional capacity for calls coming from its network to pass through Smart’s signal.

However, the wireless giant said it would only approve the request if Dito adheres to the demands of Smart.

Smart wants Dito to put up operational coordination and fraud detection systems to be able to track, mitigate and block international calls masking as local calls.

Likewise, the PLDT unit demands Dito to sign a memorandum of agreement for the cooperation against bypass activity laying out the procedures on handling illegal traffic, including the formula for computing the penalties to be imposed on fraudulent calls.

It also asked Dito to compensate it for the minutes of bypass traffic, which DITO failed to detect and block from July 2021 to current date.

“This matter is pending before the National Telecommunications Commission and thus came as a surprise when in the thick of Smart’s good faith efforts to settle the issue news of Dito’s PCC complaint came out,” Smart said.

Smart vice president for regulatory affairs Roy Ibay earlier said Dito should first eliminate its users who connect fraudulent calls before asking Smart to increase its interconnection capacity for Dito.

Ibay warned the illegal bypass committed by Dito reduces state collections as well, as it prevents authorities from raising the corresponding taxes from international voice traffic.

“Smart reiterates its willingness to grant Dito’s request for capacity augmentation, provided that it sign an agreement to compensate Smart fairly in the event that such fraudulent calls continue to proliferate. Smart cannot allow its interconnection arrangement with Dito to perpetuate fraud,” Ibay said.

In response, Dito chief administrative officer Adel Tamano said the telco owned by businessman Dennis Uy and funded by China has taken steps to lessen these fraudulent calls.

Dito vowed to pursue its antitrust cases against Smart and Globe Telecom Inc.