1477. Deputy Erin McGreehan asked the Minister for Culture, Communications and Sport whether the establishment of a centralised reporting or "umbrella" system to triage scam messages is under consideration. [55040/26]

My Department is committed to tackling scam calls and texts across electronic communications networks and services.

The Commission for Communications Regulation (ComReg), the statutorily independent regulator under the aegis of my Department, established an industry action group to address the growing menace of scam calls and texts in 2024, the Nuisance Communication Industry Forum (NCIF). This cross-industry body builds on the work of the previous Nuisance Communications Industry Taskforce (NCIT), established in February 2022.

In April of 2024, having been informed by the submissions to its consultation in June 2023 and by the work of the NCIT, ComReg mandated six interventions to tackle nuisance communications.

• Do Not Originate (DNO) list: a list of numbers that will be blocked for call origination.

• Protected Numbers (PN): The blocking of numbers that have not been assigned by ComReg.

• Fixed – Calling Line Identification (CLI) Call Blocking: Identifies and blocks scam calls originating from international networks but presenting as an Irish landline caller.

• Mobile CLI Call Blocking: Identifies and blocks scam calls originating from international networks presenting as an Irish mobile caller.

• SMS Sender ID Registry: Allows businesses to register their Sender ID. Operators would then block any SMS message bearing a Sender ID from an unregistered source.

• Voice-firewall: Software that identifies and blocks scam calls from Ireland or abroad and will help protect against future more sophisticated scams.

Operators have already implemented a number of these measures; as of May 2026, 125 million scam calls have been blocked, and 20,719 Sender IDs have been registered.

In March 2026, ComReg launched a further public consultation on potential network-based interventions to combat scam SMS.

The consultation proposed four interventions:

• SMS Base Filter: an SMS Scam filter without content scanning which analyses SMS metadata to assess the probability of an SMS being a scam.

• SIM Blocking: In conjunction with the SMS Base Filter, MNOs could automate the blocking of SIMs that send scam SMS.

• SMS Cap: a dynamic intervention that would limit the number of SMS that could be sent over a defined period of time while not restricting genuine users in their use of SMS.

• DNS Scam Filter: a filter to block/restrict access to specific websites by preventing their domain names from resolving to the correct IP addresses, redirecting consumers to a warning page informing them that they have clicked on a scam URL.

I understand that the consultation responses are currently under consideration by ComReg.

While there is no one approach adopted across all EU Member States, many of our peers across the EU are, like Ireland, considering and adopting multiple approaches to combat scam SMS, thereby providing a dynamic, layered protection for consumers.

Both my Department and ComReg will continue to examine the options available, the proportionality of any proposed interventions and the collective responsibility to be taken by the State, industry, and customers to protect ourselves, and especially those most vulnerable in our society, from nefarious actors. An area of intervention that my Department has been examining is a proposal relating to an SMS scam filter that functions like email spam filters to help reduce scam messages. Any solutions to tackle nuisance communications must be considered and weighed carefully against privacy and data protection concerns.

Further operational information ComReg can be contacted directly by emailing oireachtas@comreg.ie