SIM card registration agents across the country are using pictures of goats and foodstuff instead of human beings during the registration process, Efosa Idehen, the Head, Compliance, Monitoring and Enforcement of Nigeria Communication Commission (NCC), said on Monday.
He said: “It may interest you to know that after the telephone operators might have completed their own part of the registration and forwarded it to us as the regulators; we sometimes find pictures of goats and yams. We also do find pictures of women with men’s name and vice versa.
“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.”
According to Idehen, investigation by the regulator showed that SIM cards that were not registered were used by criminals like kidnappers.
He added that the pre-activated SIM cards were usually sold at a premium sum of N1,500 as against N100 for the normal ones.
“We have had to sanction GSM operators in the past for not monitoring the activities of their agents,” he said. “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.
“In Osun state, I arrested some teenagers of 13 and 14 years of age, took them to their parents and verbally warned them that what their children were doing would land them in problem.”
Idehen said anyone found with pre-activated SIM cards would be prosecuted and may end up paying a fine of N200,000.
The NCC is mandated to create a credible data base of Nigerians using the GSM.