April 23, 2020 Request for Alerting to Fraud by Taking Advantage of Special Fixed-Sum Cash Benefit Program (Tentative Name)

Concerning the government’s special fixed-sum cash benefit (tentative name) program, the Ministry of Internal Affairs and Communications (MIC) has today requested four groups related to telecommunications carriers to alert users to be aware of fraud. Swindlers may take advantage of the program. MIC expects that the groups will call for users’ attention through appropriate media, e.g., SMS.

The Cabinet decided on Emergency Economic Measures for Response to COVID-19 on April 20, 2020. Accordingly, the government will implement the special fixed-sum benefit (tentative name) project to support households quickly and accurately with a simple mechanism while paying attention to preventing the spread of novel coronavirus infection.
In response to the decision to implement the program, some cases were reported, in which blackguards pretended to be mobile phone operators informed users of malicious content, such as the distribution of benefits, and tried to act fraudulently based on such communication.
In light of the above, MIC has today requested four groups related to telecommunications carriers (i.e., the Telecom Services Association, the Telecommunications Carriers Association, the Japan Cable and Telecommunications, and the Japan Internet Providers Association) to notify individual users directly through SMS and other means.