Common Short Code

Introduced in the U.S. market in October 2003, Common Short Codes (CSCs) are short numeric codes of five or six digits, compatible across carriers, to which text messages can be sent from a mobile phone. Wireless subscribers send text messages to short codes to access a wide variety of mobile content, for example, to vote for contestants on American Idol. Many entities use CSCs to communicate with interested parties: television stations; individual television shows; radio stations; instant messaging services; political, advocacy, and other organizations; magazines, and sports teams &mdash; among others. Users send a message to the CSC to subscribe to alerts or other messages. Sometimes these messages are delivered for free by the originator, sometimes there is a fee.