Poe, Villafuerte push public to register SIMs

Sen. Grace Poe on Sunday called on the public to give the SIM Registration law one final push as the deadline to register approaches.

"Let’s spread the word that all must enlist their SIM for their protection and peace of mind,” she said.

Poe noted that the government and telcos should go all out to encourage our countrymen to register.

"This should be matched with a fortified infrastructure to handle thegush of transactions from those who will sign up their SIM," said Poe.

She reiterated that systems are in place to secure our information andprotect our data.

"In our SIM number, there should be no goodbye. We just have forever," she stated.

Similarly, Camarines Sur Rep. LRay Villafuerte urged the Department of Information and Communications Technology to extend for a month or two the sign-up of SIM card registration, saying holders of over 100 million SIM numbers have yet to list up as the April 26 registration deadline nears.

He reminded the DICT that a nonextension of the four-month registration period would mean the automatic deactivation the day after of the SIM numbers of subscribers who fail to beat the original registration deadline set by Republic Act 11934, or the SIM Registration Act.

Villafuerte is one of the authors of RA 11934.

“This is an 11th-hour appeal to the DICT to stretch the SIM registration period by a month or two to avoid shutting out from digital and financial inclusion the legion of Filipinos who legitimately own possibly most of the 100 millionplus still-unregistered SIMs at this point,” he said. (See full story online at manilastandard.net)