Chinese mobiles to be useless by month-end
Chinese mobiles to be useless by month-end
Around 30 million mobile phones – or about 8% of all mobiles in the country – will become useless by the end of this month. These are unbranded Chinese mobiles that do not have IMEI (International Mobile Equipment Identity) numbers and pose a serious security risk.
All mobile phone service users have been directed by the Department of Telecom (DoT) to disconnect these phones. In fact, two deadlines – January 6 and March 31 – have already been missed by the companies. Now they have undertaken to acquire the necessary equipment to track these phones by April 15 and discontinue their services thereafter – a process that is expected to take another 15 days, that is, by April 30.
Under law, all GSM phones are required to have a unique IMEI number that gets reflected at cell phone towers with which, if required, the location of a mobile phone user can be tracked. These Chinese phones, however, show up as a series of zeroes at cell towers or by their cloned IMEI number. Either way, they can’t be tracked.
Source: http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/Business/Chinese-mobiles-to-be-useless-by-month-end/articleshow/4357526.cms
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