PLDT blocks over 1 billion attempts to access CSAMs

MANILA, Philippines — The child protection platform of leading telecommunications (telco) giant PLDT has blocked more than one billion attempts to access prohibited online child sexual abuse materials (CSAMs) content by Filipino netizens in just six months of full operations.

PLDT’s artificial intelligence (AI) and automated platform, which was fully deployed in November last year, has already stored close to 300,000 banned URLs or links and they have blocked more than one billion attempts to access these prohibited content as of last May, according to PLDT Group and Smart Communications Inc. first vice president and group chief information security officer Angel Redoble.

“Last May, our last count of the number of URLs (uniform resource locators) or content that we are blocking that we have in our database is … already close to 300,000,” he said at a recent press briefing at the Cybercrime Investigation and Coordination Center (CICC).

“Since November when we deployed the (child protection) solution, we have blocked more than one billion access attempts,” he added.

Redoble joined CICC officials led by its executive director Undersecretary Cezar Mancao II at the recent inauguration of the agency’s Digital Forensics Platform and Laboratory (DFPAL) last June 17.

At the press briefing, CICC project management professional’s “highly technical consultant” bared that the Philippines was outpacing the global increase in traffic of CSAMs and online sexual abuse and exploitation of children (OSAEC).

Redoble disclosed that the PLDT Group embarked on Project Arachnid to develop the AI-powered and automated child protection platform that allows smart and efficient blocking of CSAM content access attempts in the country.

He noted that the automated system enables non-manual screening of their user’s or subscriber’s clicks of any online URLs by their own personnel.

“We don’t want that because that in itself is already a violation of the law. So, that’s automated,” he said.

“And then, these URLs are automatically translated into IP (internet protocol) addresses, then these IP addresses are broadcast to our network, telling our network that there is a user or a subscriber trying to access these IP addresses,” he added.

When it comes to their child protection platform, if a user is accessing a file or content that matches their blocklist, the user is redirected to a blocking page telling him or her that he or she is trying to access a material that violates laws, according to Redoble.

“If not, if there is no match, then the user will be redirected back to the internet,” he said.

Redoble said that the platform currently has limitations – saying they are not able to block livestreamed CSAM content, or those that use VPNs.

Redoble, however, stressed that the PLDT Group works round the clock in this effort to block access to CSAM or OSAEC materials.

“We don’t sleep, we don’t have weekends, we don’t have holidays, because our enemies are also getting better and they’re also always on (the) attack mode,” he said as he reiterated PLDT’s commitment to the importance of its child protection policy.

“It’s a policy in PLDT to protect children from OSAEC,” he added.

With its newly established AI-powered DFPAL facility, the CICC said the fight against OSAEC is top priority, as tasked to them by no less than President Duterte, according to Mancao.

“The CICC’s DFPAL was established and operationalized to conduct relentless, coordinated efforts to prevent, disrupt and possibly stop, if not mitigate, the issues of OSAEC through collaborative partnership of local and international stakeholders toward providing a cybersafe environment for children,” he said.

Meanwhile, over 23 million smishing messages have been blocked in just three days by PLDT and Smart as they reinforced efforts in preventing malicious messages from reaching customers.

From June 11 to 14 alone, PLDT reported that more than 23 million short messaging service or SMS that contain three URLs identified as phishing sites have been blocked.

The group has increased the frequency of its detection and blocking activities to keep customers safe, according to Redoble.

“We are constantly upgrading our tools to stay ahead of criminals,” he said. – Richmond Mercurio