19/03/2026
Is Ghost Traffic Draining Your SMS OTP Budget?
It is an open secret in the product and tech world: a significant portion of SMS OTP (One-Time Password) traffic is not generated by real users.
Think about the massive volumes sent every month, and then ask yourself what the actual conversion rate is.
The truth is that 'phantom' traffic is wasting budgets, and the sources are clear:
- Bots mass-testing lists of phone numbers.
- Fraudsters exploiting interconnection points to inflate traffic.
- Permissive logic (unlimited resends or too accessible buttons).
This is wasted money and inflated, misleading data.
Optimizing your OTP process is not just a technical fix; it is a direct lever for high-ROI FinOps. By tightly filtering unnecessary traffic, companies reduce their messaging costs significantly—by 20% to 40%—while improving genuine user experience.
When was the last time you audited your ratio of OTPs sent vs. successful logins?