AROUND only half – maybe even less – of active SIM cards have been registered so far with just a week before the April 26 registration deadline.
Some SIM owners don’t about the registration. (They are probably living under the rock all this time.) Others do not have legit identification cards needed for the registration. Without an ID, SIM card registration won’t be consummated.
Still, others are afraid that their right to privacy would be violated. But a lawmaker assured the public that Republic Act (RA) 11934 or the Subscriber Identity Module (SIM) Registration Law ensures consumers’ right to privacy and provides safety from text scams and other digital criminalities. We hope so. Sen. Grace Poe, who sponsored the measure until its passage last year, issued the public assurance in response to a petition filed before the Supreme Court (SC) claiming that the law violates freedom of expression and right to privacy.
Junk SIM Registration Network, the group seeking a temporary restraining order from the SC against the law’s implementation, finds it risky for the public to provide the government and telecommunication companies their personal information.
The processes of the SC in deliberating on the petition must be respected. The fate of the SIM Registration Law now rests on the collective wisdom of the magistrates of the Supreme Court.
RA 11934, which was the first measure signed into law by President Ferdinand R. Marcos Jr., aims to fight scams being made through text and online messages. The 180-day SIM card registration began on Dec. 27, 2022. SIM cards already in use but not registered during the sign-up period will be deactivated while new cards must be registered upon purchase.
Perhaps the National Telecommunications Commission and public telecommunications entities can set up more registration booths or assistance desks in a last-ditch joint effort to make Filipinos register over 100 million SIM cards. It’s possible that many SIM card owners have not signed up yet because even if they know that the sign-up is a deterrent to crime, they are probably clueless that the registration is mandatory, or that they would no longer be able to use their unregistered SIM cards because the government would deactivate them by April 27.
Yes, owners of deactivated SIMs would no longer be able to make and receive calls or access their SIMs’ data services and online connectivity, preventing them from accessing websites or using applications that require an internet connection. In this day and age of interconnectivity, this is very incapacitating.
