Pak loses 12 mill mobiles
By Bala Shah

Pakistan, like India, has excellent skill sets in the IT, BPO and Telecom sectors.  Like its neighbour, Pakistan has a thriving tech and telecom industry.  Most Pakistani’s own a mobile phone. 

Recently, the Pakistan Telecommunication Authority (PTA) had launched a SIM (Subscriber Identity Module) Information System to ‘provide a consumer-based facility to mobile subscribes in Pakistan by which they would be able to find out the total number of SIM(s) registered) against their allocated CNIC (National Identity Card) number with each mobile operator”. Pakistani’s can get this information via SMS or from the official website. Anti terrorism measures was one of the primary drivers of this security exercise.

The Pakistani CNIC Card is akin to what Mr. Nandan Nilekani is working on for India. This CNIC card provides proof of identity while buying a mobile phone.

This audit of Pakistani mobile phones has produced some shocking results. Pro Pakistani is reporting

“
There are as many as 12. Million mobile connections that do not exist anymore (are blocked) since the launch of the new “SIM Information System 668? two weeks ago.

Subsequently, the data of around 0.813 million subscribers has been rectified by the relevant mobile phone companies as the customers became aware of the new process, while nearly 5 million subscribers have sought verification from the authority so far.

PTA officials said that number of blocked SIMs could increase further as the millions of remaining customers will check their SIM information against their Computerized National Identity Cards (CNIC).
“

This begs the question if some of the Indian telecoms are doing the same.