CCK's Directive on counterfeit phones
Listers, The other day, CCK issued an ultimatum to mibile phone service providers to disable all counterfeit phones, I think by 1st September 2011 (I stand to be corrected), and I'm a bit worried on what criterion/criteria a phone is deemed fake! Is it the presence of an IMEI number? I'm still in the dark on this and I'm afraid most people are. Anyone to enlighten? Regards, Solomon
Solomon, Your concern is quite legitimate and certainly this is one issue that may indeed be perplexing many people even beyond this list. Its appropriate to state from the onset that there is need for the intended action of deactivating the counterfeit phones. Its a critical step towards addressing the broader question of information and human security. In general terms a phone will be deemed fake if it doesnt possess a valid International Mobile Equipment Identity (IMEI) code which is a 15 digit number unique to a handset. Ordinarily the IMEI code can be displayed by typing *#06# on the phone. The IMEI code surfaces on the operators network when a call is initiated making it possible to trace the handset, the caller or the call details. Without a valid IMEI criminals may take advantage to engage in secret or fraudulent communication. In simple terms they can request for your neck, kidnap, extort ransoms etc without fear of being tracked. *The Problem* This noble activity is being driven by an amateurish team. CCK has degenerated the whole affair to that of threats and intimidation to Mobile operators and consumers at large. They have undertaken to issue ultimatums without engaging the affected parties and the wider Kenyan society on the benefits of the intended action. With the new constitutional mood, even a boy can conveniently secure a court injunction to stop this process simply because a well intentioned idea is being implemented like a cattle dip project in the 80's Secondly there is absolutely no attempt to enlighten the mobile community. Less than one percent of Kenyans can distinguish between a fake and a genuine phone. This implies high chances that a consumers phone can be disabled today and a user interprets it as a technical handset issue. Worse still by evening he/she may have procured another one of the counterfeit type. Further these sort of directives tend to create technology distrust. A large number of Kenyans may not distinguish the handset as a device from other services such as Mobile Money capabilities. Such fears when embedded in the minds can have a slowing effect on technology adoption and use thus watering down the momentum of uptake. Unless something magical is done this directive might end in vain. Kamotho Njenga On Sat, Aug 27, 2011 at 12:07 AM, Solomon Mbũrũ Kamau <solo.mburu@gmail.com>wrote:
Listers,
The other day, CCK issued an ultimatum to mibile phone service providers to disable all counterfeit phones, I think by 1st September 2011 (I stand to be corrected), and I'm a bit worried on what criterion/criteria a phone is deemed fake! Is it the presence of an IMEI number?
I'm still in the dark on this and I'm afraid most people are.
Anyone to enlighten?
Regards,
Solomon
_______________________________________________ kictanet mailing list kictanet@lists.kictanet.or.ke http://lists.kictanet.or.ke/mailman/listinfo/kictanet
Unsubscribe or change your options at http://lists.kictanet.or.ke/mailman/options/kictanet/kamothonjenga%40gmail.c...
The Kenya ICT Action Network (KICTANet) is a multi-stakeholder platform for people and institutions interested and involved in ICT policy and regulation. The network aims to act as a catalyst for reform in the ICT sector in support of the national aim of ICT enabled growth and development.
KICTANetiquette : Adhere to the same standards of acceptable behaviors online that you follow in real life: respect people's times and bandwidth, share knowledge, don't flame or abuse or personalize, respect privacy, do not spam, do not market your wares or qualifications.
Kamotho, agree with your comments Effectively you will disabling a huge number of Chinese phones, which are mainly used by millions of more marginal mobile phone users, bought seemingly legitimately through sellers and traders. As COFEK put it this rule would be "akin to scoring through an offside kick while next to a referee" http://bit.ly/nIWB04 Whilst I think we can agree that there are some genuine reasons to reduce fake IMEIs on phones, one cannot underestimate the significant effects that this regulation will have amongst phone users and their livelihoods, as phones are suddenly disabled. In India, a similar directive occured on 1st Dec 2010 resulted in disasterous blackout for millions of poor mobile phone users. It also worth noting that in India, this happened even when there was strong advertising and an "implanting scheme", where innocent users would be able to fix their phones before the switch off. Can we at least expect that CCK will operate such a promotion/scheme to make users aware? [By the way this directive is also very unlikely to stop "counterfeiting", grey market phone producers can easily duplicate IMEI's or take them from dead phones, which are much harder to detect without a cross-operator, cross-national mobile equipment registry databases. The real way to stop such "counterfeiting" is to punish importers not the users, and enforce such standards at points of import and sale, not through such detrimental technological switch offs] Regards Chris -- Christopher Foster PhD Researcher, Centre for Development Informatics (CDI) University of Manchester, UK Mob: +44 (0)7751 537350 Skype: cgfoster On 27/08/11 12:46, Kamotho Njenga wrote:
Kamotho Njenga
On Sun, Aug 28, 2011 at 4:33 PM, Chris Foster <cgfoster@gmail.com> wrote:
[By the way this directive is also very unlikely to stop "counterfeiting", grey market phone producers can easily duplicate IMEI's or take them from dead phones, which are much harder to detect without a cross-operator, cross-national mobile equipment registry databases.
The real way to stop such "counterfeiting" is to punish importers not the users, and enforce such standards at points of import and sale, not through such detrimental technological switch offs]
That's it in a nutshell AFAIAC. (Walu, that means As Far As I Am Concerned) ;-)) -- Cheers, McTim "A name indicates what we seek. An address indicates where it is. A route indicates how we get there." Jon Postel
participants (4)
-
Chris Foster -
Kamotho Njenga -
McTim -
Solomon Mbũrũ Kamau