Only in the Philippines!

Soon, cell-phone users will be required to register their subscriber identity module (SIM) cards. Otherwise, they won’t be able to make calls or send text messages.

This is what the National Telecommunications Commission (NTC) is working on just in case House Bills 92 and 1313 fail to become law before the May elections.

“At this point, we are already conceptualizing who will handle the database, the cost and when to implement it. We will try to issue an NTC memorandum circular [MC] but we will need to consider a lot of things, so we need to talk with all the government agencies concerned such as the Neda [National Economic and Development Authority] and NBI [National Bureau of Investigation] on what identification card they will require,” said NTC Deputy Commissioner Douglas Michael Mallilin.

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