Stopping sim card scams

Hi, it’s Drake in New York. Sim card scams are difficult to stop. But first...Three things you need to know today:• Google shuffles worker t [View in browser]( [Bloomberg]( [by Drake Bennett]( Hi, it’s Drake in New York. Sim card scams are difficult to stop. But first... Three things you need to know today: • Google shuffles worker teams to try [to create AI products faster]( • Huawei introduces its new phone line, [putting pressure on Apple]( • Netflix adds more than 9 million customers, [but says gains will slow]( Telco workers are soft targets In recent days, employees and former employees of T-Mobile USA Inc. and Verizon Communications Inc. have reported receiving text messages asking if they would be interested in making some extra cash by helping commit identity fraud. The specific method in question is called sim swapping, which has grown tremendously, and [Margi Murphy and I wrote about last year](. A sim swap is simple. All you need to do is get someone at a wireless phone company to give you someone else’s phone number. Then, as long as your target has set up two-factor authentication on their accounts in such a way they get a texted authentication code (as many people have) you can use their stolen phone number to change all their passwords and take over their identity. You can send out messages pretending that the target needs their friends to immediately send them money. You can withdraw money from their bank accounts and, if they have them, their crypto wallets. For fun, you can deface their social media pages. To work, however, you first need to get the number. One way to do that is to try to convince a mobile phone company employee that you are, in fact, your target, and have lost your phone or gotten a new one. The far more efficient method, however, is just to bring a phone company employee in on the scam. That’s what those text messages were. [Screenshots posted to Reddit](suggest that the senders had access to employee directories from the companies—perhaps from [one of multiple recent hacks]( — and simply spammed everyone they found with offers of $300 per sim swap. Over the last year or so, mobile phone companies have tried to crack down on the practice. Last November, the Federal Communications Commission announced new regulations requiring the companies to adopt “secure methods of authenticating a customer” before switching their phone number to a new device. The companies also now must notify a customer whenever such a change is made. But as the recent news makes clear, this hasn’t stopped scammers from trying, which is exactly what the industry should expect, according to [some privacy and consumer advocates](. A big part of the reason sim swapping works is that it goes through low-level, poorly paid front-line retail and customer service employees, many of them in call centers overseas. The current measures leave much of the burden for combating sim-swapping at that level. There have been [prosecutions of telecom employees for performing sim swaps](. Lawsuits like the one in our story, however, in which victims try to hold cell phone companies themselves accountable for sim swaps, have mostly failed. The risk of identity theft, in that reading of the law, is just one of the the risks we assume when we sign up for a mobile phone data plan. In the same proposed rule where the FCC told phone companies to adopt more secure verification procedures, the agency also concluded that “it is most appropriate to allow wireless providers to analyze and implement the most effective and secure methods of authenticating customers requesting a SIM change.” Given the gaps in the current methods, this likely means sim swaps aren’t going away. —[Drake Bennett](mailto:dbennett35@bloomberg.net) Bloomberg Tech conference Hi, [Tom Giles](bbg://people/profile/1707928) here, hijacking part of today's newsletter to hype our flagship Bloomberg Tech event, coming up May 9 in San Francisco. We've got a stellar lineup that includes Anthropic co-founders Dario and Daniela Amodei, Xbox President Sarah Bond, Snap CEO Evan Spiegel and Adam Neumann, the former CEO of WeWork, to tell us about his new real estate company, Flow. I'm especially excited to get the chance to interview Meta Chief Product Officer Chis Cox, Arm CEO Rene Haas and Reddit CEO Steve Huffman. [Learn More](. The big story Apple iPhone buyers think they’re helping keep the planet green when they trade in their phone. But most consumers [have no idea what really happens to those “recycled” iPhones.]( One to watch [Watch Ibotta Chief Executive Officer Bryan Leach discuss the company’s IPO on Bloomberg Television.](​​ Get fully charged The Pentagon wants to nurture more defense startups and has put a [former Apple executive in charge of the effort](. Meta introduced the latest version of its [Llama large language model to power chatbots](. Cisco has a plan for keeping AI systems [safe from cyberattacks — use AI](. More from Bloomberg Get Bloomberg Tech weeklies in your inbox: - [Cyber Bulletin]( for coverage of the shadow world of hackers and cyber-espionage - [Game On]( for reporting on the video game business - [Power On]( for Apple scoops, consumer tech news and more - [Screentime]( for a front-row seat to the collision of Hollywood and Silicon Valley - [Soundbite]( for reporting on podcasting, the music industry and audio trends - [Q&AI]( for answers to all your questions about AI Follow Us Like getting this newsletter? [Subscribe to Bloomberg.com]( for unlimited access to trusted, data-driven journalism and subscriber-only insights. Want to sponsor this newsletter? [Get in touch here](. You received this message because you are subscribed to Bloomberg's Tech Daily newsletter. If a friend forwarded you this message, [sign up here]( to get it in your inbox. [Unsubscribe]( [Bloomberg.com]( [Contact Us]( Bloomberg L.P. 731 Lexington Avenue, New York, NY 10022 [Ads Powered By Liveintent]( [Ad Choices](