Tehran, Jan 11, Taliya News – After the passage of a few weeks from the controversial debates on copied SIM cards the country’s mobile market is now faced with deactivation of SIM cards for no logical reasons.
It is said that some SIM cards have a useful life span of a few years, or that some can handle only 48,000 contacts, but according to ICT Minister Mohammad Soleymani “No SIM card is deactivated automatically, unless there is a technical difficulty.”
According to ISNA’s IT reporter, Head of the Mobile Communications of Iran (MCCI) Board of Directors, Seyyed Ali Alavian, focusing on reports received at MCCI Subscribers Affairs Offices on deactivation of SIM cards without any logical reasons, said in an interview with ISNA, “Apparently the validity dates of those SIM cards had been expired.”
He added, “Usually the mobile phone operators insert a counter device on their SIM cards aimed at blocking the path for probable taking illegal advantage of them, such as copying them, and the MCCI, too, inserted such counters on its SIM cards as of a few years ago, set at 48,000 contacts.”
He added, “In other words, after that many turnings on and off of the set, or frequenting of the subscriber among various switching stations the SIM card would get deactivated.”
He added, “If supposedly a SIM card would be turned on an off ten times a day, and in other words, registered in the network, this would amount to 3 to 4 thousand registrations annually, and thus the life of such a SIM card would be over ten years.”
Pointing out that a deactivated SIM card has to be replaced he reiterated, “It is possible to recognize that the counter of a SIM card is full in the network and since the cost for replacement of a SIM card is charged in a mobile phone bill, the subscribers whose SIM card counters are full wont be charged any extra amount.”
Head of MCCI Board of Directors concluded his remarks arguing, “In new SIM cards the counters are set at five times higher and their owners would thus face no problems of this sort.”