Kenya warns telcom operators over unregistered SIM cards

By MACHARIA KAMAU

The Government has threatened chief executives of mobile phone operators with arrest and prosecution over unregistered SIM cards.

It said the four operators have failed to comply with a law requiring telecommunication companies to deactivate unregistered SIM cards on their networks.

Ministry of ICT together with Communications Commission of Kenya (CCK) and the police yesterday said they have arrested agents of various operators for not asking personal details when selling SIM cards.

Cabinet Secretary Fred Matiang’i said the agents would be arraigned in court.

The CEOs, he added, would be held criminally liable for letting their agents to break the law and allow continued provision of services to customers that have failed to register their personal details.

The telcos, according to Matiang’i, have also been selling pre-activated SIM cards contrary to a law requiring them not to activate the cards on their networks unless users were registered as well as deactivate unregistered users.

“I have instructed CCK to take action against the operators. The chief executives of these companies are criminally liable and they will be arrested,” he said at a press briefing in Nairobi on Monday.

Service providers

The Inspector General of Police David Kimaiyo and CCK Director General Francis Wangusi flanked him.

The ministry issued the Kenya Information and Communications (Registration of subscribers of Telecommunications Services) Regulation, 2012, which require telecommunications service providers to maintain a register of all their clients in January this year. The renewed push for SIM card registration follows claims that the terrorists that attacked the Westgate Mall two weeks ago were using unregistered mobile phones and SIM cards that have made it difficult for security apparatus to trace them.

According to statistics given by CCK, Airtel was the worst offender with 385,000 unregistered subscribers on its network while Essar (Yu) had 298,000 as of September 26.

According to the statistics supplied to CCK by the operators, Safaricom and Orange (Telkom Kenya) did not have any unregistered subscribers on their network by end of September. Both the ministry and CCK, however, said the number were suspect as CCK officials were able to purchase pre-activated SIM cards and used them before registration.

The operators are supposed to file a weekly report with the CCK, confirming full implementation and compliance with the regulations and in particular that there are no unregistered SIM cards on their networks.

CCK is, however, not content with the information that the operators have been filing and now claims that they have been feeding the regulator with incorrect information.

“The reports that the operators have been giving us have a lot of contradictions… we were able to buy SIM cards that can be activated on the spot, which shows that the information they have been giving us is unreliable,” said Francis Wangusi, director general CCK.

“Operators allowing unregistered SIM cards on their networks have to immediately stop… the chief executives will be criminally liable and we will hand them over to the police,” he said.

Kimaiyo said the police were following leads including on the communication equipment used by the terrorists but declined to comment further, saying divulging more information would compromise the investigation.

“Investigation is in progress and so far so good. We are following several leads…working on different fronts,” he said.