As the issue of unsolicited text messages continues to linger the National Association of Telecommunications Subscribers (NATCOMS) has tasked the Nigerian Communications Commission (NCC) to provide a once and for all solution this year
In an interview recently in Lagos, the President of NATCOMS, Chief Deolu Ogunbanjo said unsolicited text message is an industry problem that NCC has to address squarely this year.
“We are aware of how NCC has since last year been tackling the issue of unsolicited messages, but it remained the same.
“Until heavy sanctions are meted on the operators, that is when we can have some peace,’’ Ogunbanjo said.
He stated that telecommunications service providers do not deactivate unsolicited messages, when subscribers send “STOP” to the code provided.
According to him, when telecom subscribers send “STOP” to the provided code operators, they still charge them for sending the messages and continue sending the unsolicited messages.
The Executive Vice Chairman of NCC, Prof. Umar Danbatta, had said at various fora that the short code would enable the consumers to opt out of SMS platforms they did not subscribe to.
In 2016, the NCC introduced and had since then recorded 10,000 telecommunications consumers who have activated the code, according to statistics from NCC.
