No halt to biometric registration of mobile-phone SIM cards: Tarana Halim

The government is determined to persist with biometric registration of mobile-phone SIM cards, State Minister for Posts and Telecommunication Tarana Halim has said.

She made the government position clear after a meeting with top officials of mobile operators at the Secretariat on Wednesday. 

The High Court had recently asked authorities why biometric registration of SIM cards with citizen’s fingerprints taken by private entities should not be held illegal.

The court will hear the their explanations on Mar 24.

A writ petition had been filed against fingerprinting as part of the biometric process on the ground that it could infringe on privacy and impartiality, said the petitioner’s lawyer Muktadir Rahman.

But the state minister sounded categorical when asked about the exercise in the light of the High Court rule. “Any case initiated on the basis of rumours and disinformation lacks merit. Biometric SIM registration will continue.” 

“We will appear in court when the time comes and make a factual and IT-based presentation about the biometric registration programme,” she said.

Tarana denied claims that the fingerprints were being preserved in any form. “A particular section involved in illegal VoIP, extortion, and terrorism is spreading disinformation.”

So far, 40 percent of SIM cards have come under biometric registration and verification, she said.

Director General of National Identity Registration Wing Brigadier General Sultanuzzaman Md Saleh said the biometric registration machine did not have any device to store fingerprints.

“The fingerprint taken for SIM registration is meant only for online verification. There is no way the data can leak out of the NID database.” 

BTRC Director General Md Emdad Ul Bari, too, maintained there was no way the fingerprints could be stored.

The Association of Mobile Telecom Operators of Bangladesh General Secretary TIM Nurul said the operators were eager to cooperate on this issue.

Robi’s Executive Vice President Shahed Alam said, “Mobile-phone operators have been collecting information pertaining to subscribers for the past 20 years. This is the practice in all countries.

“The operators store about 36 types of information. But there has been no allegation ever of personal data being stolen from them.”

Grameenphone Chief Executive Officer Rajeev Sethi, Banglalink CEO Eric Aas, Airtel CEO PD Sharma, Teletalk Managing Director Gias Uddin Ahmed and top officials of other operators were present.