Four mobile phone operators in Bangladesh have blocked SIM cards which were registered in violation of a regulatory instruction that bars registration of more than 15 SIM cards against a national identity card.
Earlier, Bangladesh Telecommunication and Regulatory Commission asked the mobile phone operators — Grameenphone, Robi, Banglalink and Teletalk — to block around 20.49 lakh Illegal SIM cards at 12:00am on Friday.
Officials of the mobile phone operators said that they completed execution of the BTRC directive in the morning on Friday after initiation of the process at the specified time.
The 20.49 lakh SIM cards, which were registered in violation of the BTRC instruction, included 6.44 lakh SIM cards of Robi, 4.87 lakh of Teletalk, 4.61 lakh of Grameenphone and the rest 4.55 lakh of Banglalink.
On March 28, the commission instructed the telcos to close such SIM cards.
However, Association of Mobile Telecom Operators of Bangladesh on Wednesday requested the commission to extend the deadline by two months to June 26 stating that the closure of the excess SIM cards might hamper transaction through mobile financial services, online transaction linked with customers’ bank accounts, and one-time password-based login into the social media accounts.
The AMTOB letter also said that the operators had expanded their services to the doorstep of the customers so that the customers could continue using required number and deregister less important one.
‘If we get more time we can execute the directive ensuring minimum level of inconvenience to the customers,’ AMTOB said, adding that otherwise arbitrary barring of the number might cause inconvenience for the subscribers.
The commission, however, remained strict regarding its decision on blocking illegal SIM cards.
Teletalk head of regulatory affairs said, ‘We have blocked numbers as instructed by the commission as like the other mobile phone operators.’
‘Around 4 lakh SIM cards were blocked,’ he said, adding that the operator would check again to find if there was any SIM card functional.
Officials of the mobile phone operators said that the operators refrained from blocking some SIM cards as registration of those SIM cards were streamlined after the BTRC’s instruction.
Source: http://www.newagebd.net/article/70890/telcos-block-illegally-registered-sim-cards
