SIM card registration underway
PHUKET: Phuket Vice-Governor Winai Buapradit has urged all Phuket residents who bought prepaid Subscriber Identity Module (SIM) cards for their mobile phones before May 10, 2005 to register them with the government.
Registration began July 1 and phone users have until the end of the year to submit their registrations. A source at the Ministry of Information and Communication Technology (MoICT) told the Gazette that those who have not registered by the end of the year will have their phones service canceled.
The move follows a May 31 Cabinet resolution calling for SIM card registration in the hope that it will prevent insurgents in the Deep South using mobile phones to detonate bombs remotely without fear of being identified.
The MoICT is responsible for organizing the registration effort. Those buying new SIM cards must now present identification at the point of sale.
The registration has been criticized by some groups as an infringement of human rights and by others as unlikely to prevent bomb attacks.
V/Gov Winai added that the public could register their SIM cards at most shops selling mobile phones or at any of the following locations: Phuket Waterworks offices; Phuket Provincial Electricity Authority Office; TOT office; District (Amphur) Offices; or any Tambon Administration Organization (OrBorTor) or Municipal (tessaban) office.
Those registering must bring with them either a Thai ID card or, in the case of foreigners, a passport.
