SIM card registration: NCC decries agents using pictures of goats

The Nigerian Communications Commission (NCC) has expressed dismay that some SIM card registration agents were still using the pictures of goats and foodstuff instead of human beings to undermine the SIM registration process.

Head of Compliance, Monitoring and Enforcement of NCC, Mr.EfosaIdehen who disclosed this in an interview in Ibadan, the Oyo state capital, said that after the telephone operators might have completed their own part of the registration and forwarded it to the commission; sometimes the regulator find pictures of goats and yams. He further submitted that pictures of women with men’s name and vice versa were part of the anomalies discovered.

‘’When information got to the NCC that some people were buying SIM cards without their biometrics, it became worrisome to us because the main purpose of SIM card registration was going to be defeated,’’ he said.

According to him, the commission’s findings also showed that those SIM cards that were not registered were those used by criminals like kidnappers.
Idehen revealed that these already pre-activated SIM cards are usually sold at a premium sum of N1, 500 as against N100 for the normal ones.

He observed that the NCC have had to sanction GSM operators in the past for not monitoring the activities of their agents.
“Anyone who sells fully activated SIM cards is as guilty as the person who registers the card because they are not supposed to be registered before sale,’’ the NCC enforcement officer said.
He said anyone found with pre-activated SIM cards would be prosecuted and may end up paying a fine of N200,000.