Nigeria’s communications and digital economy minister Isa Pantami has issued a directive mandating the Nigerian Communications Commission to engage in real-time monitoring of SIM registration and replacement in what the federal government described as the SIM Identity Management Solution.

Mr Pantami, in a foreword of the second edition of the ‘Revised National Identity Policy for SIM Card Registration,’ explained that the step would reduce the incidence of fraudulently registered SIMs.

The minister, who has been under pressure to resign following his radical preachings and links to terrorist groups, directed that all SIM cards are linked with the National Identity Number (NIN) to promote national security.

With Peoples Gazette’s reports linking Mr Pantami to the Taliban, Al-Qaeda and Boko Haram, Nigerians have expressed concerns about having their data fall into the minister’s hands.

“The issue of unregistered and improperly registered subscriber identity module (SIM) cards had lingered, compromising national security and negatively affecting the efficiency of Nigerian security agencies,” Mr Pantami said in the foreword.

He said upon the issuance of his directives that the NCC carried out an audit exercise of SIMs, 9.4 million improperly registered SIMs were discovered. This, according to him, had an implication on national security.

“I issued a directive for the updating of the registration of those SIM cards by 11:59 p.m. of the 25th September 2019,” the minister said, noting that “NCC resolved the lingering issues and ensured that only those properly registered were eventually reactivated.”

Mr Pantami further stated that “a robust SIM Identity Management Solution should be deployed for effective implementation of the federal government’s directive on mandatory use of National Identification Number (NIN) and to reduce the incidence of fraudulently registered SIMs (pre-registered SIMs) to the barest minimum.”

Key feature of the SIM Identity Management Solution

i. Real-time monitoring and authorization of SIM Registration and SIM Replacement transactions in accordance with the NIN policy;

ii. Collation and linkage of registered SIMs on all networks to users NIN;

iii. Uniform Software Application (Software Development Kit (SDK) with device location tracking capabilities to be deployed on all SIM Reg Terminals; and

iv. Monitoring and Management of data capture devices (including identities of SIM Registration Agents) with capabilities to disable and blacklist devices, as well as Dealers/Agents, found to be carrying out spurious SIM Registration and SIM Swap transactions.