Online today, the creation of fake accounts in various forms is supported by an underground market that sells text message-based verifications for these accounts. Now, researchers have developed a global index that tracks the price of these fake-account text verifications, revealing price spikes around elections and market trends that reflect national telecom costs. The findings offer policymakers a new window into how online manipulation operations take shape in real time. The internet is saturated with inauthentic activity, ranging from benign automation to networks of fake accounts promoting scams. Most platforms attempt to curb mass fake account creation through SMS-based identity verifications. However, a robust underground market selling on-demand verification codes has risen in response. According to Anton Dek and colleagues, this new industry quietly underpins much of today’s online manipulation. To illuminate this poorly understood market, Dek et al. created the Cambridge Online Trust and Safety Index (COTSI), which tracks the daily price of SMS verifications across 197 countries and more than 500 online platforms. According to the authors, at least 17 providers openly sell on-demand SMS verification codes, mostly targeting Russian- and Chinese-speaking customers. Providers bulk-purchase SIM cards (physical or virtual), and because each SIM can only be used once per platform, prices vary widely across countries and services.

Using API-accessible data from four major SMS providers, Dek et al. collected one year of global price and stock data and matched these figures with country-level economic and political indicators. The analysis revealed that SMS verification prices are highest in countries where SIM cards are expensive or heavily regulated, such as Japan, Australia, Turkey, and Malta, and that the key forces shaping these prices are simple economics. Scarce verification supply, higher national wealth, and fewer phones per person all increase cost. Countries where verifications are least expensive include Indonesia, Russia, and the United Kingdom. Although the cost of SIM cards is also an additional major factor in verification prices, the findings suggest that sociopolitical conditions within a provider’s country show little meaningful influence on pricing. Notably, Dek et al. found that the cost of verifications for Telegram and WhatsApp rises before national elections, indicating heightened demand for locally registered accounts for influence operations during politically sensitive periods. This pattern is not observed for platforms that allow for easier creation of non-local accounts. According to the authors, these patterns clearly illustrate supply and demand dynamics within the online manipulation economy and highlight the transitional, grey-market nature of this industry. The findings also suggest clear points of intervention. For example, making SIM cards harder to acquire in bulk, enforcing bands on SIM farms, or increasing transparency around where accounts are registered could curb mass account fabrication. “There is a risk that the publication of this paper alerts SMS verification providers, who might then make access to their APIs more difficult, complicating future study,” write Dek et al. “Nonetheless, we believe that our findings serve as a starting point for boosting trust and safety on online platforms.”

Data is available for the creation of data visualization images. For further information, please contact Dr Jon Roozenbeek (University of Cambridge) at jjr51@cam.ac.uk.

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