Pakistanis face a deadline: Surrender fingerprints or give up cellphone

The Washington Post, Drudge.com ^ | February 23 at 7:20 PM | Tim Craig and Shaiq Hussain

[Patriot777]

ISLAMABAD, Pakistan — Cellphones didn’t just arrive in Pakistan. But someone could be fooled into thinking otherwise, considering the tens of millions of Pakistanis pouring into mobile phone stores these days.

In one of the world’s largest — and fastest — efforts to collect biometric information, Pakistan has ordered cellphone users to verify their identities through fingerprints for a national database being compiled to curb terrorism. If they don’t, their service will be shut off, an unthinkable option for many after a dozen years of explosive growth in cellphone usage here.

Prompted by concerns about a proliferation of illegal and untraceable SIM cards, the directive is the most visible step so far in Pakistan’s efforts to restore law and order after Taliban militants killed 150 students and teachers at a school in December. Officials said the six terrorists who stormed the school in Peshawar were using cellphones registered to one woman who had no obvious connection to the attackers.

But the effort to match one person to each cellphone number involves a jaw-dropping amount of work. At the start of this year, there were 103 million SIM cards in Pakistan — roughly the number of the adult population — that officials were not sure were valid or properly registered. And mobile companies have until April 15 to verify the owners of all of the cards, which are tiny chips in cellphones that carry a subscriber’s personal security and identity information.

In the past six weeks, 53 million SIMs belonging to 38 million residents have been verified through biometric screening, officials said.

Muhammad Safdar, 30, uses his cellphone in Islamabad after he and his three children waited in line for hours for a biometric screening that would allow him to keep the phone. (Tim Craig/The Washington Post)

[Patriot777]

Government internet control, SIM data mining, and now I bet our next technological heads-up (bag over the head) will be that we will also be required by executive order (as law has been thrown out the window by Obomination) to be fingerprinted or our cell phones will be confiscated.

[proxy_user]

Easy to fake. The terrorists need only hire a street vagrant to go in an give his fingerprints.

[WayneS]

I just received a vision of Obama’s next executive order...

;-)

[9thLife]

Pakistan isn't known for its technological prowess. I wonder where this idea was developed.

Of interest.

[wally_bert]

A new freelance gig for bums on the street.

[Buckeye McFrog]

It’s a Muslim country. Few would have any compulsion against whacking off someone’s hand if needed.