Political advisers on a south China provincial committee Thursday (Jan 20) proposed that cell phone-number buyers be required to register their personal details, to curb telephone fraud.
The proposal was raised by 16 members of the provincial committee of the Democratic National Construction Association in south China's Guangdong Province at the local legislature's annual session.
They also proposed telecommunication companies strengthen their monitoring efforts.
Wang Zhengyin, one of the advisors, cited statistics from the Ministry of Public Security as saying that Chinese residents in coastal cities and provinces lost at least 600 million RMB (90.9 million USD) to telecom fraudsters last year.
A typical fraud ring deploys stringers to make random phone calls or send text messages to lure victims into wiring money into bank accounts under various pretexts -- such as to claim lottery winnings.
A second group of stringers is then deployed to withdraw the wired money from ATMs.
Police say it is difficult to catch the stringers making the phone calls. Some of the rings' bosses are based overseas.
China has more than 800 million mobile phone subscribers. No personal details are required to purchase a new mobile telephone number.
The government has taken a series of measures to combat telecom fraud, including by posting warnings on ATMs and requiring bank tellers to question customers who want to wire money to strangers.
