On Teacher’s Day, September 10th, Mr. Zhu from Hubei sent blessings via text messages to more than forty teachers, only to receive a message from the service provider shortly after, stating that his number was suspended due to abnormal activity.
Mr. Zhu told the Red Star News that he had a good relationship with his teachers during his school days, and it has been his habit for many years to send blessing messages to them on Teacher’s Day. On the morning of September 10th, Mr. Zhu began sending messages to the teachers one by one, and some of the recipients interacted with him.
Mr. Zhu calculated that he sent a total of 53 messages that morning, out of which 44 were successfully delivered. It was not a group message, and there were no unusual operations involved.
At 11:06 a.m., he suddenly received a message from the service provider, indicating that his number had “anomalies” and would affect normal usage, requiring verification.
After clicking on the verification link in the service provider’s message, he went through facial recognition and other procedures. The verification completion screen suggested completing the review before 19:00 that day. Worried that the verification might be completed too late, he called 10086 to inquire about why his phone number was experiencing anomalies, but the customer service representative did not provide a clear answer. He urged for a quick verification result, and the customer service representative advised to “wait patiently.”
Concerned about work delays, Mr. Zhu then went to a nearby China Mobile store for inquiries. The store’s backend system showed that the request to suspend Mr. Zhu’s phone number was a “double suspension” (meaning the phone could not receive or make calls, and the text messaging function was also halted), with a risk level of “high.”
“Following the store’s request, I removed the SIM card, presented my ID, underwent facial recognition, and even signed a non-fraudulent commitment letter. After about fifteen minutes, my phone was back to normal,” Mr. Zhu said. “From suspension to restoration took a little over an hour. During this time, I was unaware of which teacher replied to my messages, causing interruptions in communication and potential missed calls from others.”
According to reports, a search on social media found that many users posted about their experiences of sending multiple messages and getting their service suspended.
In the afternoon, China Mobile customer service staff responded that they could not currently provide a specific threshold for triggering system anomalies from sending messages. However, if a user sends significantly more messages in a month compared to previous months, the system would generally detect and alert of anomalies. Currently, the handling of online telecommunications fraud is strict, and as long as the number is proven to be in personal use, the anomalies can be lifted.