Digital literacy campaign aims to equip Thais to deal with online scams
An anti-scam digital literacy campaign was launched on Friday in a bid to make Thai users vigilant and equipped to tackle online deception, as well as support Thailand’s sustainable digital economy.
The #ThaisAware campaign is a collaboration between short-form video platform operator TikTok, the Ministry of Digital Economy and Society, the Office of the Consumer Protection Board, the Bank of Thailand (BOT), the Central Investigation Bureau, the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC), the Electronic Transactions Development Agency (ETDA), COFACT Project and the Thailand Consumers Council.
Under the campaign, government agencies and civil society organisations will launch educational content based on their expertise. For instance, the BOT and the SEC will play a pivotal role in educating and raising awareness about deception in financial transactions, such as loan scams, investment fraud or romance scams.
Meanwhile, the consumer protection board and the consumers council have joined forces to provide knowledge on how to act when falling victim to online scams, including cases where consumers receive unfair or substandard products.
The campaign also allows TikTok users nationwide to create their content and put a hashtag #ThaisAware on it to communicate warnings and enhance skills to combat digital fraud.
“TikTok believes that digital literacy is crucial in building defence mechanisms against online threats. We are committed to ensuring our platform remains a safe space for creativity,” the company’s head of public policy for Thailand, Chanida Klyphun, said.
Meanwhile, DES Minister Prasert Jantararuangtong stressed that enhancing digital awareness and literacy among the public would be pivotal in combating persistent online deception.
“When citizens are empowered, everyone becomes vigilant, reducing the risk of falling victim to online scams and aiding government efforts to combat malicious entities,” he said.
Online fraud poses multidimensional threats to Thai consumers, particularly social media users lacking awareness of online dangers.
Citing reports by the Cyber Crime Investigation Bureau, TikTok noted that 700 scams and fraud cases had occurred daily, with 40 per cent involving e-commerce crime.
As many as 19,960 online complaints were reported to the ETDA in the first half of this year (January-June). The most reported issues were online shopping scams (43.44%), followed by illegal websites (31.27%), and other issues like investment scams, online job fraud and personal data protection (25.29%).
“This causes significant harm to individuals and small businesses,” the company said. “Furthermore, cyberattacks compromise critical data, facilitating easy manipulation by cybercriminals.”
Addressing these escalating issues and the continuous evolution of deceptive tactics underscores the necessity of staying informed to safeguard consumers and foster a secure digital future, it added.
“Nowadays, online fraud and scams are one of the most pressing issues in Southeast Asia and also Thailand, as they impact people’s lives and undermine the trust of the digital economy,” TikTok director of public policy for Southeast Asia Shinto Nugroho said.
She confirmed that the company was paying attention to the safety of platform users, revealing that the company had deleted 160 million videos that violated its community guidelines in the first quarter of this year.
Of them, 98 per cent were deleted before publishing and 90 per cent were deleted within 24 hours, she added.
