The UK mobile industry is losing up to £140million (about 157 million euros) a year on premium rate fraud, according to BillingScore.
The cost of fraud affects not only the mobile operators, but all the players in the mobile industry, from SMS wholesalers and aggregators, through to content providers and ultimately retailers and their consumers.
By not tackling this issue, the UK’s mobile operators are leaving themselves exposed to a massive risk and it is consumers and retailers that are paying the ultimate price.
The problem of fraud is set to get worse as mobile purchasing becomes even more prevalent through the rise of in-application payments and near field communications (NFC) payments.