The Hindu Business Line : DoT tightens norms for subscriber verification

Compliance call
Cellular operators asked to verify the identity of all subscribers by March 31, 2007.
A minimum penalty of Rs 1,000 per subscriber would be levied on the operator, if found guilty.

New Delhi , Dec. 1

In a bid to reduce misuse of cellular phones by anti-social elements, the Department of Telecom has issued tighter norms for verifying the identity of subscribers, which include a fine on operators who do not follow the verification norms.

DoT has asked cellular operators to verify the identity of all the old and new subscribers by March 31, 2007.

If any subscriber is found to be without proper verification after the set deadline, a minimum penalty of Rs 1,000 per subscriber would be levied on the operator.

The new norms were issued on November 22. "For ensuring that the complete subscriber information is available with all the service providers and the same is duly verified, it has been decided that each licensee shall take up re-verification of the existing subscribers on priority and ensure the process is completed by March 31, 2007," the DoT guidelines said.

DoT said there shall be 100 per cent check of documentary proof of identity and documentary proof of address.

"The licensee company shall cross-verify the information from the actual user by calling the respective subscriber. There shall not be any connection working after March 31, 2007 in the licensee's network without having subscriber information duly verified," said the new DoT norm.

Pre-activated cards

DoT said that it had the right to take suitable action in addition to the fine in case the operators fail to comply with the instructions.

DoT has also barred operators from stocking pre-activated SIM cards in the market.

Operators have been asked to appoint separate officials who shall be responsible for the process of entry of subscriber information in the database and cross-checking of information from the database with the documents submitted by the subscriber.

The move comes after security agencies uncovered cases where bulk connections were issued with no proper identity proofs.

Security agencies said terrorists were using cellular phones and lack of proper documentation was making it difficult to track them.

More Stories on : Telecommunications | Regulatory Bodies & Rulings

Article E-Mail :: Comment :: Syndication :: Printer Friendly Page