Passport needed to buy mobile phones!

[black knight]

It seems that Nepal was far ahead in the row to build counter-terrorism techniques ;) The policy that the UK govt is gonna deploy now, we have it from the age we heard that we are to now be facilitated with cellphones. Passport or other sort of official identification is now being made mandatory in the UK to all the phone buyers and database is being maintained for the old. Just shared it here.....

One query though any other such information with anyone as what the US and other such Top Ranked countries in the world has initiated steps related to the subject here to tackle terrorism...i am sure after the 9/11 attacks the US must have had much of such initiations as probably the UK did this (Here, I am trying to relate it to the london bombings).

"Everyone who buys a mobile telephone will be forced to register their identity on a national database under government plans to extend massively the powers of state surveillance.

Phone buyers would have to present a passport or other official form of identification at the point of purchase. Privacy campaigners fear it marks the latest government move to create a surveillance society."

http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/politics/article4969312.ece

--
- in a quest lacking destinations.

[Bipin Gautam]

On 10/20/08, black knight <l3lac...@gmail.com> wrote:

> "Everyone who buys a mobile telephone will be forced to register their
> identity on a national database under government plans to extend massively
> the powers of state surveillance.
>

But hey, mobile phone IMEI can be forged and new SIM can be bought
easily from a different location, stored offline for some month and
dispose it immidiately after 1 time use and again IMEI changed or the
cellphone disposed completely like sim. I wounder how would it catch
terrorists. It may just disclose their last known location based on
record from the BTS.

But even in Nepal government has the potential to extend powers of
state surveillance very easily.

See, To register for NTC SIM you need to put in your real identity,
photocopy of your citizenship certificate and a hand drawing to of the
road to your home.

If you read Bank agreement to open a new account in more than a few
places i have read "bank can share/shell your info to any third party,
agents or government. Nepal IPS's and Telecom share user record / IP
info to police without a proper warrant (just on a phone request) and
the request could be a legitimate request or just out of curiosity and
without proper suspecion and doubt or a real case.

While filling gov forums you must remember filling the name of your
Father and grandfather and all other personal info. The day this info
is put in a database family tree of anyone can be known by gov. While
filling your exam forum you are required to fill your fathers name,
paste your latest photo, your home address/telephone, all personal
info that you can imagine. Put this info in a database and you could
get info about who went to school with who.

If you know valley mapping project... Nepalese gov already have a
digitized data of your home location, name of the owner of your home
(preferably your dad). Your ISP/ Cable tv provider probably has your
email account that you have given to their CSR during registration and
that is preferably what you use with your hi5/facebook account.
Hospitals (eg: bir hospital, teaching hospital) record patient info
digitally....... just look around and you will see lots of similar
examples.

I see all this as a ticking time bomb. Least, in foreign there is
awareness and citizens understand the meaning privacy more than us.

If you read some Nepalese law/ or privacy policy of business in Nepal
(least digitally) it would translate to,
- Gov has the right to know what its citizens are doing and and
request any info accordingly and business should comply to the policy.
- Business has the right to use, share, disclose any gathered user
info as they please and its just their moral obligation to protect the
data. Its not a legal oblication (==carelessness in customer data
handling)

In Nepal, gov and business collected as much personal info as possible
and (believe me) most of them are pooooorly guarded but they dont have
the capability to know about their citizens like foreign gov only
because they are not properly organized but till when is the question?

And i believe given enough budget (well less than 1 corer would do)
gov can launch a sister project and could nicely categorize all these
info to a central location within 1 year.

I have herd from "A SOURCE" "A GOV AGENCY" here in Nepal has such
database storing impressive details of personal info about ALL
bureaucrats of Nepal.

...Privacy is long dead, worldwide!

[black knight]

On Mon, Oct 20, 2008 at 1:15 PM, Bipin Gautam <bipin....@gmail.com> wrote:

But hey, mobile phone IMEI can be forged and new SIM can be bought
easily from a different location, stored offline for some month and
dispose it immidiately after 1 time use and again IMEI changed or the
cellphone disposed completely like sim. I wounder how would it catch
terrorists. It may just disclose their last known location based on
record from the BTS.

well yes that can be done but, here in case oh phone buyers i doubt the companies have a record for who bought, what fone, with what IMEI, with what SIM, number and all...so if not one...any of those can be used to track 1 down...least a pinch of information can be ripped of to initiate a hunt!

But even in Nepal government has the potential to extend powers of
state surveillance very easily.

See, To register for NTC SIM you need to put in your real identity,
photocopy of your citizenship certificate and a hand drawing to of the
road to your home.

[...............]
Yea they have it all but what I don't understand is, has the service provider ever queried for a information to be a forged? they ask me for photocopies they dont wan't the originals....well NTC later asked for the originals ;) I aint trying to poke out the misses the service provider here.

.

I see all this as a ticking time bomb. Least, in foreign there is
awareness and citizens understand the meaning privacy more than us.

and yes as you put it, the information that the companies here have can and are being ripped of easily on a single call without any verification of the inquirer....and the case that these information being digitized is probably another threat....to the time they aren't made secure...the farth i have seen in a few banks and a few other INGOs, NGOs and other such places where one's personal identity is kept (preferabbly in digital form), they dont even care standing behind a computer technician when he is at work! and on such world we are to go in electronic papers n stuffs!...god save our souls there ;).....though i am saying this ... i myself can't deny when a bank/ISP or telco itself asks for my personal details...i have to give it away to them...sole reason i dont have another way out...my privacy is said to be guaranteed but seems to be only in papers.

only thing we can do is hope for a initiation of safety and security and a promise to disclose our details on our authorization to the extent possible! ... just hope!

Regards,

Black Knight