Bhubaneswar: Worried with the seizure of more than 16,000 illegal pre-active SIM cards from the criminal gang here on Tuesday, Police Komisiance Bhubaneswar wrote to telecommunications operators to further strengthen their customer’s verification system.
Seven people, including two employees from a private telecommunications company were arrested for allegedly selling SIM cards that had been activated for cyber criminals in other countries.
According to orders issued by the Department of Telecommunications (DOT) on August 9, 2012, the sale of a pre-active SIM card is illegal and anyone who promotes immoral practices must be punished by Rs 50,000.
However, the police are on their toes due to illegal sales and purchasing SIM cards that have been activated continuing in Odisha despite periodic hard action.
“We have asked telecommunications service providers to stop verification without allcer.
Because the final activation is done at the end of the telecommunications operator, Onus lies in them.
It is not possible to issue a SIM card that was activated previously if the telecommunications operator did the right verification,” said Deputy Commissioner of the Uma Police Shankar Dash.
The police said the SIM card could not be activated until the customer details were available at the center database of the service provider concerned.
In accordance with the norm of the existing point, the person at the point of sale (post) will get the customer acquisition form (CAF) is filled and signed by the customer.
The authorities in the post will record in CAF that he has seen customers and has matched the attached photos in CAF.
The cellular connection will be activated only after all the requirements are met by the customer and the details have been updated in the customer’s database of the license holder.
Dot orders say mass cellular connection, involves publishing 10 or more than 10 SIM cards on one name to individuals is not permitted.
Bulk cellular connections are only available for companies or organizations with certain conditions.
Komisiance Police warned legal action against telecommunications companies if their employees found a convention with vendors to sell SIM cards that have been activated to achieve their sales targets.
“We will take some accusations on detention to identify their other gang members.
We can write to WhatsApp to find out whether one of the activated SIM cards is used by anyone,” said Dash.
This would be a time of testing for the Komisiancah police to track cyber criminals, who had bought a pre-active Sims of the defendant.
The police said the gang had sold more than 2 pre-active Sims in recent months.