Deactivated SIM card owners get 90-day amnesty to verify

A TOTAL of 970,046 unverified Subscriber Identity Module (SIM) cards, which is equivalent to 1.58 per cent of all mobile phone subscribers, have been deactivated by the Tanzania Communications Regulatory Authority (TCRA) as of midnight of February 13, this year.

However, the deactivated subscribers have been given a grace period of 90 days to verify their numbers.

The deactivation of the SIM cards comes in the wake of a clampdown by the industry regulator against unscrupulous subscribers, who use unvalidated mobile phone numbers to commit fraud through mobile devices.

Speaking on behalf of TCRA Director General, Dr Jabiri Bakari, the authority’s Principal Communication Officer, Mr Semu Mwakyanjala, told ‘Daily News’ yesterday that a total of 52,000 SIM cards used to defraud people were recently disabled by the authority following complaints from members of the public.

Mr Mwakyanjala noted further that 60,478,759 active SIM cards had been biometrically verified by the deadline of the verification exercise which was on February 13, this year. The number represents 98.42 per cent of all active subscribers before the deadline of the verification exercise.

Before the deadline of the verification exercise, there were 61,448,805 active subscribers across all major mobile phone operators in the country.

Giving the breakdown of the unverified SIM cards, Mr Mwakyanjala said 318,000 subscribers of Airtel Tanzania were deactivated followed by 315,250 subscribers of Tigo and Zantel.

Vodacom Tanzania Plc had 235,413 of its subscribers disabled, while Viettel Tanzania which trades as Halotel saw 100,627 of its customers blocked.

“The deactivated subscribers have been given a grace period of 90 days to verify their numbers failure of which their mobile phone numbers will be allocated to other customers,” Mr Mwakyanjala stated.

The official was impressed that the verification exercise had recorded positive response from mobile phone subscribers across the country.

“The verified SIM cards play a crucial role in ensuring security and confidence in the use of mobile communication devices,” he explained.

Verification of the SIM cards is in accordance with the Electronic and Postal Communications Act (EPOCA), 2010 as well as Electronic and Postal Communications (SIM card registration) Regulations of 2022.

The SIM cards are registered by matching subscribers’ fingerprints with those in the National Identification Authority (NIDA) database.

According to communications statistics report by TCRA for the second quarter of financial year 2022/2023 spanning between October and December, last year, SIM cards subscriptions have increased by 4 per cent from 58.1 million subscriptions, in September 2022 to 60.3million as of December 2022.

Mobile phone operator Vodacom Tanzania Plc leads the market by having 30 per cent of the market share, followed by Airtel Tanzania with 28 per cent while Tigo is on the third position with 26 per cent of the market share.

“There is no operator with a significant market share in terms of subscriptions, which signifies that there is a healthy competition among the operators in retaining consumers and recruiting the new consumers,” the report by TCRA showed.

According to the report by TCRA, the second quarter of 2022/2023 experienced a significant increase of subscriptions to 2.2 million subscribers from 1.9 million subscribers who were registered during the first quarter.

“The reason behind such increase may be associated by end of year festivals where many people like to communicate with families and friends around the world hence demanding new SIM cards,” the report reads in part.

Despite the increase in subscriptions, TTCL lost about 5,623 subscribers during the second quarter of financial year 2022/2023 while subscribers of Airtel Tanzania increased from 16.4 million in October to 16.6 million December, last year.

On the other hand, Vodacom Tanzania Plc increased its subscriptions from 17.8 million to 18.1 million subscribers during the period under review while Tigo increased its subscribers from 15.6 million to 15.9 million.

Halotel registered 8.02 million subscribers in December up from 7.4 million subscribers who were recorded in October, last year while Smile Tanzania increased its subscriptions to 15,547 from 14,841 during the same period.

In early November, last year, TCRA blacklisted and deactivated 52,087 international mobile equipment identities (IMEIs), including those involved in theft and fraudulent activities through mobile phone networks.

An IMEI is a unique code used to identify an individual mobile telephone in Global Systems for Mobile (GSM) communication networks.