As part of efforts to combat fraud in upcoming nationwide SIM re-registration exercise, the National Communications Authority (NCA) has announced stringent measures.

According to the Authority, it will include a one-time password (OTP) verification to the process, this is to confirm the identity of SIM card owners, while enhancing the overall security of the registration process.

The Director-General of the NCA, Edmund Yirenkyi Fianko, gave the announcement on Sunday, March 22, while speaking to the media.

He added, “We are saying that you should not use your card to register numbers for others because you must give your consent. With the new system, you will receive an OTP, and by using it, you are confirming that you have approved the registration”.

On Monday, March 9, the Cabinet gave the green light for a completely new SIM registration exercise following an extensive review of the previous process.

This was announced by the Communication Minister, Samuel Nartey George, during high-level discussions with the Ghana Chamber of Telecommunications and the National Communications Authority on March 9.

Between 2021 and 2023, the erstwhile government ordered a SIM registration exercise in Ghana, which required all mobile subscribers to re‑register their SIM cards using the Ghana Card; an exercise aimed at checking fraud and enhancing national security, but was plagued by weak biometric enforcement, data inconsistencies, long queues, and widespread complaints, leaving many citizens frustrated and some SIMs blocked over incomplete processes or unsuccessful registration process.

Consequently, the Ningo Prampram MP revealed that the imminent exercise will not be a continuation of the previous one, which was undertaken by the former government, but will be a completely new reset exercise.

How different is this exercise from the previous one?Detailing the difference between the previous registration and the yet to be conducted one, Mr Nartey noted that the imminent exercise will feature centralised data under the National Communications Authority, strict biometric enforcement, cross‑network fraud prevention, and new legislation.

The Minister said, “A Central Equipment Identity Register (CEIR) will be introduced to enable cross-network blocking of stolen or fraud-linked devices”, adding that, “a revised Legislative Instrument (L.I.) is being prepared to regulate the exercise.”

Telecom operators who participated in the meeting welcomed the initiative but raised some operational concerns.However, it is not yet clear when the new registration exercise will commence or who will bear the cost of implementing it.

Meanwhile, NCA has emphasized that the decision for the re-registration exercise is to establish a more reliable subscriber database while correcting irregularities identified during earlier registration processes.

This information was disclosed by the Director-General of the National Communications Authority, Edmund Yirenkyi Fianko on Monday, March 9.

He noted that, “What we want to do is to have a single source of truth. We want to ensure the ID details are correct and that the person who brought the ID is indeed the person”.

According to him, documents submitted by subscribers during the first registration exercise conducted in 2011 did not meet verification standards, leading to inconsistencies in the subscriber database.

“This will be the third official registration process. The first one was done in 2011. The challenge with it is that there was no verification at all of the IDs. What we did was a manual verification of some limited cases along the way,” he said.

He added that, “There was supposed to be verification of the ID card; we did one part of it, but the second part didn’t happen. The policymaker, NIA, couldn’t get alignment to do the second phase, which was the validation of the biometric.”

“There are cases, including fake photos, where the same name is used by a different person. We saw fake IDs used to register”.