Authorities in both the UK and Australia have come out saying the mobile premium content and services industry needs more regulation. UK’s communications regulator Ofcom has issued a report into the participation TV scandal which swept the country this year… it found that compliance failures were systemic and some broadcasters appeared to be in denial about their responsibilities, revenue generation was a major driver in offering participation TV features and there was an apparent lack of transparency through the supply chain. For their part broadcasters were concerned of a lack of clarity between the two regulators Ofcom and ICSTIS. Lack of clarity aside, things like telling people to keep sending in votes long after they have stopped tallying them is clearly in appropriate. Richard Ayre, a non-executive member of the Ofcom Content Board and former Deputy Chief Executive of BBC News who led the inquiry, made a very succinct point on why it’s important for the industry to behave itself: “Phoning a TV show isn’t like ordering pizza. When you put the phone down nothing arrives: you just have to trust that your call was counted. If broadcasters want audiences to go on spending millions calling in, they need to show they take consumer protection as seriously as programme content.”

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Meanwhile, Australia’s Communications Minister Senator Helen Coonan has conceded that the regulatory system imposed last year to govern premium mobile content services is not adequate, reports the Australian. She said that she would write to the Australian Communications and Media Authority (ACMA) telling it to ensure that service providers are absolutely clear about the terms, conditions and costs of what they are offering in their advertisements. Also that consumers have an easy “opt-out” method and that it takes place immediately.

[Rob] At least one broadcaster is concerned about the issue: The BBC has canceled all competitions across radio, TV, interactive and online, as the U.K.‘s snowballing participation TV scandal unearthed more transgressions at the corporation. Regulatory inquiries launched earlier this year, after channels operating phone-in or SMS contests were found to have placed fake contestants, have uncovered more and more such examples. Now the under-pressure BBC has admitted six more shows, including charity extravaganzas Children In Need, Comic Relief and Sport Relief, also faked phone-in winners when producers posed as contestants. Senior editorial staff have been suspended pending a review, Guardian reports.