Solomon Owusu, the Director of Communications for the United Party (UP), has quizzed the Minister of Communication, Digital Technology, and Innovations, Sam George, on what the consequences will be if the SIM registration fails to achieve its purpose.
According to Solomon Owusu, the registration under Ursula Owusu was undermined by ego and power struggles between the Ministry of Communications and the National Identification Authority (NIA).
Speaking in an interview with Accra-based TV3, Solomon Owusu stated, “What assurance is the minister giving to us that this time around? When he fails, what must the country do to him? Is he going to put his job on the line?
Is he saying that if he’s unable to, after the registration, there are still forces in the system, he must be sacked from office, or he must be in prison? Or what should happen? Because Ursula Owusu gave us the same assurance. Today, she’s chilling somewhere. Nobody is taking her on.”
Solomon Owusu argued that if telcos fail, they should be sanctioned, and if the minister fails to enforce the law, he should face consequences too.
In related news, Sam George has assured Ghanaians that the upcoming SIM registration exercise will be the last.
According to him, the government rolls out a robust, technology-driven system designed to enhance convenience and eliminate fraud.
“The fact that you have multi-agency collaboration on this is something that you didn’t see in previous times.
You have the NIA (National Identification Authority) being our single source of truth when it comes to IDs, the NCA (National Communications Authority), the ministry, Immigration Service, Ministry of Foreign Affairs, and other agencies all working together.
“What you see today is the product of very hard and difficult conversations, and that gives me the confidence that if we execute this right, this will be the final SIM registration exercise,” Mr George explained.
“This registration is 75 per cent communication and 25 per cent technology,” he said
He further ruled out automatic migration of existing SIM data into the new system saying, “You are not cleaning up. You are actually migrating the viruses.
You have infected files, and you are migrating them onto a new system.
You are basically replicating the problems of the old system.
And that’s part of the reason why we can’t do a wholesale migration. And that’s cured today by NIA’s solution that they are offering to us based on the collaboration we are having with them,” he said.
Meanwhile, Sylvia Owusu-Ankomah, the Chief Executive Officer of the Ghana Chamber of Telecommunications, has said the planned SIM registration is not going to be a silver bullet that stops fraud.
The Telecoms Chamber CEO highlighted that consumer awareness and protection of personal identification numbers are critical in stopping the growing threat of mobile-related frauds.
She stressed that most of the mobile related fruad are driven by social engineering schemes where fraudsters impersonate trusted individuals or institutions to scam persons from disclosing sensitive information.
Speaking in an interview on Citi Business News, Sylvia Owusu-Ankomah explained, “SIM registration is not going to be a silver bullet that stops fraud. The nature of fraud that we are currently experiencing as a country is mostly on a social engineering scheme.
When I say social engineering, these are legitimate individuals who would call you and pretend to be somebody else and, you know, seek information from you and fraudulently, you know, lead you into releasing your personal identity, your personal identity number.
“Your PIN is sacred. So to the extent that you protect your PIN, there shouldn’t be room for someone to defraud you,” she said.
She added, “What the SIM registration will do, however, is to ensure that for every subscriber, your number is biometrically linked to the national ID database, which means that if you are not the user, if I acquire a SIM card, which was acquired by someone else, and I use it, I purchase that SIM and I do not register it directly, any crime that is committed with that particular number will be linked back to me as a user.
“So I do think that there is the need for a lot of consumer education around protecting our SIM, around ensuring that the numbers that we register are authentically ours and that you do not go and purchase a SIM card that has been pre-registered, because it means that if any fraudulent activities undertaken with that number, you will be tracked and you will have to bear the consequences of it,” she added.