Phone scams and identity fraud the focus of Consumer Rights Day
“Calls and text messages to consumers: services or scams?” This is the question that kicks off this year’s International Consumer Rights Day, organised by consumer organisations and associations in collaboration with Barcelona City Council. The meeting is being held in the foyer of the Municipal Consumer Information Office (OMIC), at Ronda Sant Pau, 43. To attend, please register by sending an email to consum@bcn.cat

Following the initiative from 2024, consumer rights associations, in collaboration with Barcelona City Council’s Consumer Public Services (Municipal Consumer Information Office – OMIC and the Consumer Arbitration Board – JACB) are organising a meeting and a discussion where consumers and companies can all participate.
This year’s topic is the prevention of identity fraud and scams conducted with phone calls or text messages. Firstly there will be a lecture with the latest information on legislation and the protection of consumers. This will be followed by a round table to discuss the issue.
Participating in this session will be:
- Guillermo Canal, telecommunications engineer and arbitrator for Arbitration Boards
- A representative from the Mossos d’Esquadra police corps and expert on cyberdelinquency
- Josep Aulet, from the UCC
- Albert Garreta, lawyer and mediator from the CUS/ACPB
- Gerard Hernández, from the FACUA
- Moderator: Xènia Escoda, head of the legal area of the OCUC
Cybercrime on the up
In recent years we have seen how cybercrime has mushroomed, a particular rise in identity fraud using phones, whether with calls or SMS. These crimes tend to start with a call or a text message, where the originating party imitates the identity of a trusted organisation, normally banks, public administrations or transport companies. These practices have the clear intention of tricking and defrauding the consumer so that they provide personal information and confidential financial information, give their personal identity codes or carry out an action such as accessing a website, calling a phone number, ordering a bank transfer, contracting a service etc.
These scams cause serious financial and economic harm to all sectors of society, including consumers, companies and public bodies. Besides economic considerations, they also lead to a growing distrust of electronic communications among consumers. This means people are suspicious when answering calls and reading text messages, which is damaging to companies and bodies making legitimate use of a communication channel.
We pointed to this in last year’s meeting for Consumer Rights Day, which addressed AI in consumer relations. The session noted that technology is advancing very quickly, but that people are unprotected against bad practice, abuse and scams. This is why we want to mark Consumer Rights Day with a meeting to talk about the lack of protection and about scams using phone calls and text messages. In addition, we’ll discover the measures being put forward by consumer associations, public administration and security bodies with the goal of prevention and the protection of consumers.
More information
- Coneix les associacions de persones consumidores
- [PDF] - Qui protegeix els drets bàsics de les persones consumidores?
- Més informació de l'OMIC
- Més informació de la Junta Arbitral de Consum de Barcelona (JACB)
- Agència Catalana de Consum - Activitats del Dia Mundial dels Consumidors 2025
- Diputació de Barcelona - Dia Mundial del Consumidor
- Mossos d'Esquadra - Consells pràctics i operatius per evitar ser víctima d'un frau