Smart Communications will bring to the table its expertise and knowledge of global best practices as it continues to work with the government to ensure consumer protection through measures like the SIM card registration bill.
This comes after the President’s recent veto of the measure and reports of the Senate President’s announcement of his plan to use Congress’ power to override the veto.
“More than supporting the legislative process, we at Smart are also willing to share our own experiences, as well as our knowledge on the best global practices, to contribute to the success of the SIM card registration bill, if and when it is passed into law. We also welcome any opportunity to support the government in developing the bill’s implementing rules and regulations,” said Alfredo S. Panlilio, PLDT Inc and Smart Communications President and CEO.
Speaking to reporters on the sidelines of PLDT’s tower deal announcement, PLDT chair Manuel V. Pangilinan reiterated the company’s support for the measure. “We still are hoping that we will find a way to get the SIM cards registered. That’s important, not only for our business but for Filipinos in general.”
Smart and PLDT have been active in collaborating with government and regulators for consumer protection. Through its Cybersecurity Operations Group, PLDT has invested billions to beef up its cybersecurity defenses, not only to protect its own infrastructure but mostly to help protect customers from cyber threats and phishing and scamming activities. The group also regularly and actively campaigns to inform and educate customers and help them identify red flags that indicate scams and fraud.
Also Read: PLDT, Smart successfully block over 1B access attempts, 224K URLs linked to online child abuse
PLDT and Smart have also embraced their role in the fight against online sexual abuse and exploitation of children (OSAEC) by rolling out relevant policies, technology solutions, and community programs that uphold the safety and welfare of children both online and offline. This includes investing in a pioneering Child Protection Platform and embedding it into the Group’s 24/7 cyber security operations. This solution allows the Group to detect, predict, respond, and prevent domain and content-level access to child sexual abuse materials. As of end-March 2022, PLDT and Smart have already blocked an accumulation of more than 1 billion user access attempts and over 224,000 online content and web pages linked to OSAEC.
PLDT’s Data Privacy Office has also been taking the lead in holding Group-wide data privacy trainings to equip leaders and employees alike as data privacy champions for customers.
