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Telecommunication
service providers and consumer associations critiqued the Nigerian
Communication Commission (NCC) on the regulations that will govern SIM
card registration at a public meeting in Abuja yesterday.

The safety of
personal information and the process of identification were two of
several concerns brought by MTN, Airtel, Etisalat, the National
Association of Telecomm Subscribers (NATCOMS), and the Association of
Licensed Telecommunications Operators in Nigeria (ALTON), the five
institutions that submitted critiques to the NCC on the first draft of
regulations.

The initial draft
of regulations, which was published on the NCC website and sent out to
service providers to get feedback, establishes a central information
database that will be controlled by the commission. Third party
contractors, hired by the NCC, will collect personal information for
the database such as one’s place of origin, as well as fingerprints.
The regulations also allow the use of a ‘proxy’, which means that a
person can register a SIM for someone else. However, the person who
registers the SIM is liable for any criminal activity associated with
it.

The NCC’s assistant
director, Yetunde Akinloye, who made the presentation, said that the
commission has taken “reasonable precautions” to make sure data is safe
and will have “control, administration, and management of the central
database.”

When all the data is collected, it will be sent to the National Identity Management (NIM).

According to Mrs.
Akinloye, third party contractors, which will be hired by the NCC to
collect people’s information and service companies, will face fines and
penalties if they keep or give out any unauthorised information.

Still concerned

However, Deolu Ogunbanjo, national president of NATCOMS, is still concerned.

“What about NCC or
government itself who are going to be in charge of the database? How
safe is the information of the subscriber? There must be total
confidentiality and privacy,” he said.

Mr. Ogunbanjo also
said that the government needs to put a tracking system within the
central database, so that when any information is released, it can be
traced back to the person who released it.

People registering
will be required to present a national identification card, a driver’s
licence, or an international passport to verify identity. These
requirements could cause potential problems for some Nigerians,
especially people living in rural areas.

“Many subscribers don’t have any of these three,” said Mr. Ogunbanjo.

The executive vice
chairman of the NCC, Eugene Juwah, said that if Nigerians have none of
the accepted forms of identification, the NCC will accept an
authenticated letter from a local government chairman with a picture
attached.

Mr. Ogunbanjo said he is worried that corrupt local governments will charge constituents for a service that should be free.

The commission,
which is supposed to start registration early next year, has yet to
begin any noticeable media campaign to inform subscribers that
registration is mandatory or what the registration process involves.
The registration is supposed to last for six months, a time frame which
all five institutions said might be too short.

Mr. Juwah accepted
that the registration may take longer than the allotted time, but he
said all companies involved should work hard to meet the deadline.