Pakistan war on terror; 100M mobile customers may lose service

On Dec. 16, terror struck in Peshawar, Pakistan, when the Taliban targeted an army school. The terrorists massacred 145 people, most of them children.

It was revealed that the terrorists communicated through prepaid subscriber identification modules. After receiving that information, the Pakistani government immediately issued a 28-day deadline for carriers to reverify subscribers who use the prepaid SIMs.

The SIM fallout

According to Dawn, there are an estimated 140 million SIMs in Pakistan and 120 million of them are prepaid. Dawn reports that telecom operators are unable to reverify the customers within the 28-day deadline, and are seeking an extension of up to 200 days. Carriers say if the extension is not granted, they will be forced to block the prepaid SIMs in order to meet the deadline.

Last July, the Pakistan Telecommunication Authority implemented a biometric verification system in order to stop the sale of illegal SIM cards. Since then, complaints have continued over the sale of unauthorized SIMs. In November, Pakistan officials announced that Afghan SIMs had been disabled by blocking roaming in Pakistan.

The debate

In an interview with Dawn, Sohaib Sheikh, the former head of marketing for Wateen Telecom, said: “From the security point of view, the pre-biometric era was not different from the post-biometric regime. Earlier, terrorists used unregistered SIMs for communicating with each other and now they are using registered SIMs.”

Telenor’s chief corporate affairs officer, Mohammad Aslam Hayat, said that every SIM is currently verified.

“There is no such thing as unverified SIM. Every mobile operator has a record of SIM sales from its warehouse up to the retail level, where subscriptions are acquired. Against every SIM sold, mobile operators have necessary data as per the regulatory requirement,” Hayat told Dawn.

The consequences

An official with a leading telecom company said if carriers are forced to block the prepaid SIMs the public will ultimately suffer.

Representatives from Mobilink, Ufone, Telenor, Warid and Zong are expected to meet with Pakistani officials this week to discuss a possible solution. If no agreement can be reached, more than 100 million customers could be left without mobile phone service.