All Answers: RE: [pakgrid] Monitoring of Suspicious Mobile Phone SIMs

Now a days original CNIC is compulsory to activate a SIM.

Sincerely,
Atif.

To: pakgrid@yahoogroups.com
From: ishtiaq.ahmad@gmail.com
Date: Fri, 23 Nov 2012 15:05:16 +0100
Subject: Re: [pakgrid] Monitoring of Suspicious Mobile Phone SIMs

its very simple Zarrar :) let suppose you bought a SIM for a corner shop and as a gentleman you provided him a copy of your CNIC.

Few hours/days later I also when to same shop and ask for a SIM, shopkeeper asked for CNIC copy but I don't have it (in our society no body carry CNIC with them all the time) instead I ask him can you manage without it, he said, no problem sir.

Now what will happened in long run, shop keeper have few CNIC copies respect to many SIM card sold, he will just make an other photo copy of your CNIC to put my SIM on your name, this the only logical explanation which I can com-up by having 3 SIM card registered on my CNIC :(

Having a CNIC per SIM(there is a upper limit) is a rule/law which is not fully implemented by mobile companies, yes they do fill paper trails. The reason is very obvious, if all mobile companies start following the law strictly then their sale of SIM will drop down.

This practice is being exercised all over the world, you can buy a SIM at London, Amsterdam etc. with out showing any identity, the only difference is in their approach. They solve this problem by giving costumer incentive like, "you have a 10 Euro balance in this SIM" but to get this 10 euro talk minutes you need to register this SIM via our website or by sending your information via SMS (taking away registration process from shopkeeper). Every logical human being will take advantage of this 10 euro deal but if he chose not to; those unregistered SIM will keep working as normal. There is very good use of these unregistered SIM, use it as baits/honeypot (do some fishing here) and 2ndly your job of monitoring SIM is much simpler now because you only have to monitor small group and those to whom these linked/called from registered SIM pool.

Solution exist, there is only need for willingness and to implement it right way.

On Mon, Nov 19, 2012 at 3:03 PM, Zarrar Yousaf <zarrar_yousaf@yahoo.com> wrote:

Dear All,

There is indeed a dire requirement to develop intelligent and automated process for detecting illegal Sims, but I want to understand how can one acquire a SIM "illegaly" and yet remain anonymous. Aren't the SIMs issued against a valid CNIC card?

Regards

Zarrar Yousaf

From: Rehan ul hassan <rehanjafry@gmail.com>
To: pakgrid@yahoogroups.com
Sent: Saturday, November 17, 2012 9:19 AM
Subject: Re: [pakgrid] Monitoring of Suspicious Mobile Phone SIMs

Agreed.... Academic and industry should come up together for this cause.

On Thu, Nov 15, 2012 at 10:34 PM, Sajjad Haider <shaider@gmualumni.org> wrote:

Dear All,

I wrote the following piece as a "Letter to Editor" but I am not sure if this would ever get published. Nevertheless, considering the interests and affiliation of the members of this group, this is probably the most relevant forum for discussion on this theme.

Best regards,
Sajjad
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Dr. Sajjad Haider
IBA, Karachi

Monitoring of Suspicious Mobile Phone SIMs

In the past couple of months, the government has resorted to an extreme measure of blocking mobile phone SIMs to thwart potential terrorist attacks. Despite the fact that the government must be praised for taking a preemptive measure in public's interest, no matter how naive it may sound, this cannot be a long term and permanent solution. Instead, what we need is an analytical framework that aids competent authorities in identifying suspicious use of mobile phone SIMs. It is worth mentioning that illegal SIMs are not only used by terrorists for suicide or remote-controlled bombings; they are also used by extortionist and kidnappers to run their illegal activities.

Artificial intelligence (AI) based techniques can help in identifying mobile phone SIMs that are being used for illegal activities. We already have precedence in the form of Anti-Money Laundering Act that requires banks to report suspicious activities to a Financial Monitoring Unit (FMU) that may initiate further investigation against the beneficiary or executor of a suspicious transaction. To comply with the Act, all banks have deployed artificial intelligence and statistical reasoning based tools that help in the identification of suspicious patterns. In a similar spirit, automated tools that can identify suspicious usage patterns of mobile phone SIMs need to be deployed by mobile network operators and their findings should be reported to Pakistan Telecommunication Authority (PTA), Interior Ministry or any other competent government body.

It is worth mentioning that AI techniques have been used throughout the world by the telecommunication industry to develop churn models that help mobile network operators to predict customer attrition. One can deploy similar AI techniques to predict if a particular mobile phone SIM is being used in a suspicious way. It can also be argued that learning from the experience of banking sector in tackling suspicious activities would also be very useful in developing the proposed analytical framework. Implementing rules that are similar to the existing banking procedures can result in the deactivation of many unwanted mobile phone SIMs. For instance, if a person does not use his bank account for 6 months then the account becomes dormant. In a similar way, a (prepaid) mobile phone SIM not being used for few months should be deactivated and a personal visit should be the only mechanism for its activation.

There is no doubt that a successful implementation of such analytical framework would require research and development efforts by both academic and industry but it is the only long term viable solution to the volatile law & order situation in which we are living.

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Best Regards,

Rehan Jafry.
\http://www.linkedin.com/in/rehanjafry