PLDT Inc. wireless unit Smart Communications Inc. is optimistic the subscriber identity module (SIM) card registration bill, if passed into law, will boost e-commerce and fintech services in the country.
This, after the House of Representatives approved the proposed measure on third and final reading earlier this week.
House Bill (HB) No. 5793 mandates every public telecommunication entity or direct sellers to require buyers or existing owners of SIM cards to present a valid identification with photo and accomplish a control-numbered registration form.
PTEs and sellers would also have to establish a SIM card register and submit its updated database to the Department of Information and Communications Technology every six months.
Failure to comply with the measure allows telco entities the authority to automatically deactivate their services to prepaid SIM card customers, according to HB 5793.
“It will boost e-commerce and fintech adoption and growth, in the sense that the process of SIM registration already hurdles the know-your-customer step required when signing up for fintech apps like PayMaya and other digital services. The mobile number is now associated with a subscriber,” Roy Ibay, Smart vice president for regulatory affairs, said in a statement.
Ibay, who also serves as the vice president and director of the Philippine Chamber of Telecom Operators, said the bill should also provide safeguards to avoid disruption of service for prepaid subscribers, by giving them enough time to register their SIMs and ensuring that adoption or use of the national ID is already in place.
“We hope that the subscribers will be given at least a year to prepare and register their SIMs,” he said.
A similar measure is pending in the Senate. If passed, lawmakers believe that the bill can restrict criminal and fraudulent acts being carried out using mobile SIM cards. – Myla Iglesias
