Pakistan: End of MNP?

Posted on December 20, 2011 / 4 Comments

Has Pakistan made mobile number portability a terrorist act?

The Minister directed Chairman PTA to revisit the whole system and ensure that all those illegal SIMS which are being used on stolen identity shall be blocked.
The meeting decided that in view of the grave complaints, Mobile Number Portability (MNP) by the service providers is banned in future and anybody found violating should be booked under Anti-Terrorism Act, 1997 as it is against the national security.
Anybody misusing, sending threatening emails or tampering with email address, mobile phone via SMS, MMS etc shall be dealt with under ATA and other relevant sections of law.

News report.

4 Comments

Neel GInasinghe
December 21, 2011, 9:39 am
Dear Prof Samarajiva,

I read this about North Korea.
“…A nation that doesn’t apparently have a mobile operator or access to internet but crucially has nuclear power. Interesting. Its always nice to read about North Korea. ”

Is this true about mobile access and Internet in North Korea?
1. Rohan Samarajiva
  
  December 21, 2011, 10:09 am
  
  The ITU is the authoritative source of telecom data. According to the ITU DPR Korea had 431,919 mobile connections at end 2010 (1.77 mobile SIMs/100 people). News reports indicate they will hit a million by year end 2011. It had, at end 2010, higher mobile penetration than St Helena and Myanmar.
  
  N Korea started with 3G. The operator is Orascom of Egypt.
  
  The ITU reports no Internet data from DPR Korea. That does not mean there is no Internet use within government. But use among the public is likely to be minimal to none.
Neel GInasinghe
December 21, 2011, 10:32 am
Prof,

Is there any country with no mobile and no internet?
Rohan Samarajiva
December 21, 2011, 12:17 pm
I’ve just come back from Myanmar. They have both (but not in adequate quantity).

St Helena (pop 5,000 ish; claim to fame: prison of Napoleon) may be your best bet.