SIM card registration will help reduce crime

 I AM glad James Marape is calling on mobile phone operators 

to register all SIM cards issued.

This is a good idea because it will solve a lot of problems from marriage breakdowns to prostitution and even curb crimes such as car thefts, break and enter, etc.

The national statistics office could also use the data as a source of information in registering the people on the common roll.

Details include name, date of birth, place of origin, residential address, etc, will be helpful when it comes to census updates in­cluding details on the population, migration, employment and other necessary data.

Children could also be re­stricted from accessing illicit sites on the internet. 

Married people may own two SIM cards, one for extra-marital affairs, while criminals may buy a few SIM cards which they can discard once carrying out their activities.

When people have two or more SIM cards, it will be hard  

to know who owns which cards.

During my days at Digicel as 

a switching engineer, I was in­volved in a police mission to trace and catch car thieves, which we did successfully.

I am glad I helped the police.

The government, with the help of IP bearer control protocol and the national information and communication technology authority or whoever is responsible, must make sure all SIM cards under a network are registered.

Former Digicel engineer

Chimbu