AirtelTigo has given the holder of a fraudulently registered SIM card 30 days to regularize the registration of the SIM card or it will be deactivated.
This stems from the story of a young and respectable chief whose Ghana Card was used to register at least seven AirtelTigo SIM cards without his knowledge and consent.
According to the chief, who pleaded anonymity for very genuine reasons, he was “shocked to the bones” to find that AirtelTigo did not immediately deactivate the SIM after it became sufficiently clear that it was registered fraudulently.
Meanwhile, the SIM Registration Act gives no such 30-day window to fraudulently registered SIM cards, but for reasons only known to AirtelTigo, they have decided to keep the fraudulently registered SIM on the SIM register in no one’s name for 30 more days.
The facts of the matter is that on March 24, 2023, the chief invited a SIM registration agent he knew, to his office to assist him register a new MTN number for the purposes of a fundraiser he was assigned to coordinate for a group he belongs to.
The agent successfully assisted the chief to link the SIM card to his Ghana Card via the *404# short code and also captured his biometrics as required by the second stage of the process. But the agent could not continue the process to get the card activated because he got feedback that the chief’s Ghana Card had exhausted the maximum of 10 numbers that can be assigned to each Ghana Card.
According to the chief, he did not trust the feedback so, he even accused the agent of using a faulty device, and then asked him to use the Ghana Card of one of his (the chief’s) workers to register the SIM and that went through without any challenge. This was when he actually realized that the feedback on his Ghana Card could be right.
So the chief probed further through an acquaintance within the industry and found that there were seven AirtelTigo SIM cards linked to his card, which he knew absolutely nothing about.
The chief told Techfocus, he had never used AirtelTigo in his life so he was surprised about how AirtelTigo staff or agents even got hold of his Ghana Card details.
So, he went to the AirtelTigo Head Office at Barnes Road to verify for himself. At AirtelTigo he was given a form to fill and list all the “strange” phone numbers linked to his card. The AirtelTigo staff then pulled his details on their system and indeed all those seven numbers were linked to the chief’s Ghana Card.
“At this point the whole thing became scary for me and I began to think of how exposed we are as a people,” he said.
The AirtelTigo staff then proceeded to make calls to all seven numbers. Five of them did not ring at all, but two rang. Out of the two, only one was picked up by a guy who said his name was Honest. The AirtelTigo staff asked him (Honest) what card was used to register his SIM, but the staff did not let the chief hear the guy’s response. She then told him the card will be delinked from his SIM card and he had 30 days to regularize his registration or his SIM will be deactivated.
This is where the chief got even more worried – that he, the fraudulently registered SIM card would be allowed to remain active for 30 more days even after it has been identified as fraudulent and delinked from his Ghana card.
So, the question is, if indeed the SIM has been delinked from the chief’s Ghana Card, whose credentials are on the SIM in the current SIM register? And if the holder of the card uses it to commit a crime, which Ghana Card would it be traced to?
Again, based on which law or policy did AirtelTigo given the holder of the fraudulently registered SIM 30 days to regularize the credentials on the SIM – is it in accordance with the SIM Registration Act or an internal AirtelTigo policy.
Techfocus reached out to AirtelTigo and gathered that indeed it was the company’s decision to give the holder of the fraud SIM 30 more days before deactivation.
Meanwhile, the SIM Registration Act itself does not allow any such 30-day window for fraudulently registered SIM Cards. A source at the NCA also told Techfocus such a practice is a complete No-No.
