Investigation reveals fraudulent subscriptions to Vodacom WASPs

[Jamie McKane]

Investigation reveals fraudulent subscriptions to Vodacom WASPs

A new investigation revealed that Vodacom has billed its subscribers for content services without their permission. In simple terms, it means Vodacom is stealing airtime from its own customers.

Airtime theft and fraudulent subscriptions are nothing new on Vodacom’s network, but to date, the operator has blamed rogue WASPs for this fraud.

 

[Dan C]

 

[marine1]

So all these years we have been right? Skelms

 

[IssiAmd]

Postpaid
On two occasions I was billed incorrectly.
"system errors" I was told.
Account was credited.

I wonder what's the rand value per month of these "errors"
Individuals who check statements will pick up the errors.

Corporates or even SMEs are unlikely to pick up a few hundred rand discrepancies.

 

[SlowInternet]

They always blame the client

 

[marine1]

A lot of people are owed apologies

 

[LazyLion]

Vat hom Fluffy!!!

 

[bwana]

Should they find that partners have transgressed contractual service levels, they will take appropriate action including the claw-back of funds, the termination of agreements and other legal action.

Yeah, sure. They'll rebrand and you'll be back at the teat in no time. Symbiotic relationship where one parasite feeds off another.

 

[SilverCode]

I bet if you sat down with a Vodacom network engineer, he could rattle off many ways that a rouge WASP or even someone inside Vodacom could subscribe a user to a service without them knowing. The problem is once that information has passed through all the departments and levels of management to the broken telephone of the corporate mouth piece or the CEO, the facts have been so watered down by each person in the chain to cover their own asses that what comes out at the end is "there is no problem".

I'm sure there is someone deep inside Vodacom (and MTN) screaming and shouting at his superiors about how broken the system is and how it needs to be fixed, but it is falling on deaf middle-management, profit seeking ears.

 

[Umzimbeet]

I was subscribed to content services on a backup data sim that had not been used for a long time. I had 2 instances of the billing. My first contact with Vodacom I was basically told that there was nothing they could do except unsubscribe the sim. I called again and got someone a lot more helpful. They raised an incident and I got 1 payment credited but not the 2nd one. I have cancelled the data sim now because I expect to be hit with this again.

 

[CataclysmZA]

I bet if you sat down with a Vodacom network engineer, he could rattle off many ways that a rouge WASP or even someone inside Vodacom could subscribe a user to a service without them knowing.

There's an API that does this automatically. A WASP could build a bot that adds ten new subscribers every hour and it wouldn't even look fraudulent because Vodacom adds slightly more than 3500 new subscribers per day.

 

[ProfA]

i dont blame Vodacom. who wouldn't steal (some would even say profiteer) when they know there are no consequences? i blame idiot customers who seem to love being stolen from.

 

[system32]

i dont blame Vodacom. who wouldn't steal (some would even say profiteer) when they know there are no consequences? i blame idiot customers who seem to love being stolen from.

+1
VodaCon learnt from our fearless leaders in Government.

The only way this is going to stop is when someone lays criminal charges against Shameel Joosub and he goes to jail.

Where's ICASA / Consumer Protection when you need them?

 

[noxibox]

I bet if you sat down with a Vodacom network engineer, he could rattle off many ways that a rouge WASP or even someone inside Vodacom could subscribe a user to a service without them knowing. The problem is once that information has passed through all the departments and levels of management to the broken telephone of the corporate mouth piece or the CEO, the facts have been so watered down by each person in the chain to cover their own asses that what comes out at the end is "there is no problem".

I'm sure there is someone deep inside Vodacom (and MTN) screaming and shouting at his superiors about how broken the system is and how it needs to be fixed, but it is falling on deaf middle-management, profit seeking ears.

Why assume the CEO doesn't know exactly what is going on? Don't they get paid extra for company performance?

 

[Solitude]

Vodacom said it strongly denies allegations that “have led to MyBroadband repeatedly accusing Vodacom of knowingly facilitating fraudulent activity on its network”.

Vodacom added that it is aware of MyBroadband’s rationale for wanting to keep its “single source” anonymous.

However, Vodacom said it “respectfully contends that MyBroadband also has a duty, particularly when it is relevant, to inform its readers of the source’s motives”.

MyBroadband informed Vodacom that the articles and investigation over the past few weeks were based on multiple sources, as well as Vodacom subscribers who have been victims of airtime theft.

It is therefore not a “single source” with an ulterior motive, but rather numerous victims of fraud on Vodacom’s network and industry players trying to prevent this fraud.

Oh man, I love that bit so much.

 

[Bighit]

"Vodacom said it strongly denies allegations that “have led to MyBroadband repeatedly accusing Vodacom of knowingly facilitating fraudulent activity on its network”."

Hmmmm, politicians play book this, always deny.

 

[Sapphiron]

Glad I left them years ago. I am also considering taking all our staff cell numbers, porting them to our VOIP provider and giving staff data only SIMs from Afrihost or RAIN. Most of them are on Wifi all the time and have our company SIP on the cellphone.

I know it's a lot more complex, but it keeps me from having to deal with airtime fraud.

 

[Dups!]

Oh boy!

 

[supersunbird]

@Jamie McKane maybe suggest to Vodacom to harmonise the USSD command for blocking content services to be the same across prepaid, postpaid and topup contracts and put it at most 1 level down but preferably on the main USSD page even if the last item.

 

[genetic]

Great article, and good on MyBB for the investigation - don't let Vodacom bully you.

Vodacom said it strongly denies allegations that “have led to MyBroadband repeatedly accusing Vodacom of knowingly facilitating fraudulent activity on its network”.
Vodacom added that it is aware of MyBroadband’s rationale for wanting to keep its “single source” anonymous.