ShenTeh:
Number (MSISDN) recycling is international best practice. No need calling out MTN, other telcos or NCC. It not only betrays our Ignorance but shows our poor grasp of the products we are using.

The lifespan of your MSISDN ownership is dependent on your recharge history. For most networks, the number of times you recharge (not denomination, just number of times) extends the validity of your ownership by 90 days. When this validity period expires, your line becomes inactive, upon which when you recharge you get 90 days, etc. This way people can get lifetime validity.

When you do not recharge in this inactive status, the line becomes deactivated 90 days from the inactive status date. A deactivated line can still be redeemed from your network provider with some basic requirements. It remains in this state for another 90 days. When you make no effort to redeem the deactivated SIM and tge 90 days elapse, the MSISDN (your number) is recycled and you forfeit ownership.

Fair enough. Otherwise telcos will just be selling numbers to claim largest subscriber base without bothering on quality and customer retention.

vandertommy:
it's actually a directive from NCC to block or recycle lines that have been dormant for more than 6 months. So NCC is actually to be bamed for all these

zoedew:
The smart will look through the T&C of MTN and sue as appropriate.

edoairways:

decatalyst is right on this one. Majority of Nigerians don't read instructions on the products or service they buy. Secondly the regulatory commission are helping matters, rather they charge huge amount to issue new number series. The service providers had no choice than to re issue old lines since it cost more to get new number series (0803,0806, etc).

hisexcellency34:
Nothing bad in recycling numbers..as long as you dont commit fraud with it

Morikaih:







thanks for the write up Bro..

The problem here is our Old cargo and primitive ones called NCC , they have messed up this country hence MTN can take advantage

A nation of 200Mil without database has the power to reassign subscriber identification number without any consultation either from criminal dept or society..

NCC is a disgrace and full of old fools that are in the system without basic Technology know how..

valiju:
I bought a new SIM card some months ago I wanted to top up airtime for internet data ,so I dial GTB ussd code from my sim 2 instead of my sim 1 .
To my greatest suprise the transaction was successful and I ended up buy airtime from the previous owner of the new line I recently bought, I have to visit GTB to deactivate the line from that account

musicwriter:


For all the countries I've been, there's no difference between the way MTN recycle inactive phone lines in Nigeria and the way its done elsewhere. As a matter of fact, Nigeria is not the only country where MTN does business. I am on a business trip outside Nigeria as I write, and I have two MTN lines right now previously owned my a native here. And yes, I received his/her bank alert few days ago but which I quickly deleted.

Every GSM company every place I know, recycle inactive numbers. Its not only done in Nigeria.

Is Buhari's daughter the only person in Nigeria who've ever dumped a phone line before? How about millions of other Nigerians who have used several phone lines in the past but which now belong to someone else?

The problem is not MTN but because you're ruled by a tyrant who can imprison you up for 10 weeks because you innocently purchased a phone line previously used by his daughter. When a country has a bad leader, the people live in fear. You jailed someone because he bought a phone line formerly used by your daughter?!!. I just can't get my head around this. This type of news is unheard of even in North Korea.

tk4rd:
And now, we are not finding any of it funny any longer..
Recycling may be an standard international practice,, but it is really posing great problems to the Nigerian Users.

edoairways:

Ignorance and poor education of Nigerians by the regulatory commission is the root cause of this menace. They just have to come up with something reasonable to resolve the issue raised by op

ImaIma1:
That's how one guy kept loading airtime from an elderly man's pension account because of this same line recycling. He loaded almost 20k airtime over a period of time

tk4rd:

It is possible that your lines were not actually cloned.
May, they were recycled..
Have you investigated properly??

Ay04z:
Seconded, first page material unless lalasticlala is one one of mtn staff

oluwaseyi000:
Are these telecoms claiming there is absolutely no way to restrict all ussd transactions and previously sim-tied message on recycled numbers until new users activate them for their own account

Afterall all ussd transactions goes through the telecoms, if you can wipe my name, fingerprint and other information associated to my previous sim card why can't you wipe my bank accounts tied to the same sim card

tk4rd:
Who do we blame here??
Meanwhile, if DSS gets at that your guy, he is going in for it ooo.

tk4rd:
Wait..
So GLO and Etisalat (or abi 9mobile) do the same thing to people too?

ImaIma1:


My guy ke! The elderly man was a bank customer. By the time we called the "thief", he started crying on the phone . He didn't even have the liver for what he was doing.

We just advised the customer to change the number for his account. This was about 5 years ago. So this recycling number problem didn't just start.

tk4rd:
Dear MTN..

I am going to be very brief on this, but I would make my points very clear.

You people had been doing “recycling of numbers” of innocent Nigerians who had not used their lines for up to one year or more, and the only remedy you guys put in place was to introduce a service known as “Keep My Line”, which you guys did not even sensitize the citizens on or make popular enough, and as a result, lots of the helpless Nigerian citizens did not even know about this service.

This had cause a lot of people to loose their precious numbers just like that, only because they had the opportunity of travelling abroad for some jobs or for studies, or maybe for one serious reason or another had a good cause to temporarily abandon their main lines for more than one year..

MTN, you guys never thought that these recycled lines might had been connected to the original owners bank-accounts, and that the new owners of these lines would now be given express unchecked access to these bank account through the USSD Mobile Banking Methods.

...Yess..
Someone recently bought a new line, and with all the happiness that he was able to still see a “0803...” number still available, the next thing he started seeing were messages from lots of people he never knew, lots of calls from unknown persons mistaking him to be the husband of one certain lady and telling him to hand the phone over to her so that they can talk to her directly.. Meanwhile, this guy had not married. He doesn't even have a serious girlfriend at the moment. To cap it all, he continued receiving series of endless debit and credit alerts on his phones of transactions he knows absolute nothing about.
He first went to the bank to stop the endless alerts, but they told him that he wasn't the one to apply for the change of number, but the original owner of the bank-account.

Now, imagine that this guy here has someone working in the bank who is ready to divulge information to him for some chicken change,, all he needs is just the correct account number of the person, and he would activate the USSD mobile banking options on the bank account..
What if the original owner had already activated USSD Mobile Banking?? In that case, all that the new owner of the line would do is just to dial the USSD mobile banking code for the bank, and start trying his best to change the transaction PIN or Password.

Dear MTN, if you guys may recall,, there is a recent issue which is already in court between You (MTN), Hanan Buhari (President Buhari's Daughter), The DSS, and one Anthony Okolie from Delta State.

To be honest, you MTN are the main cause of all the problems here. You guys blocked off Hanan in the first place and she lost her precious line.. Then you went ahead to sell the same line as a new line to an innocent unsuspecting Anthony.
Tell me, is it his fault that he bought the line..
You guys are totally guilty here.

And the earlier you stop doing this recycling of numbers, the better for you guys.
More criminal cases are still coming.

The case of Anthony Okolie and Hanan Buhari is just the beginning.

tk4rd:
Dear MTN..

I am going to be very brief on this, but I would make my
The case of Anthony Okolie and Hanan Buhari is just the beginning.

tk4rd:
Dear MTN..

I am going to be very brief on this, but I would make my points very clear.

You people had been doing “recycling of numbers” of innocent Nigerians who had not used their lines for up to one year or more, and the only remedy you guys put in place was to introduce a service known as “Keep My Line”, which you guys did not even sensitize the citizens on or make popular enough, and as a result, lots of the helpless Nigerian citizens did not even know about this service.

This had cause a lot of people to loose their precious numbers just like that, only because they had the opportunity of travelling abroad for some jobs or for studies, or maybe for one serious reason or another had a good cause to temporarily abandon their main lines for more than one year..

MTN, you guys never thought that these recycled lines might had been connected to the original owners bank-accounts, and that the new owners of these lines would now be given express unchecked access to these bank account through the USSD Mobile Banking Methods.

...Yess..
Someone recently bought a new line, and with all the happiness that he was able to still see a “0803...” number still available, the next thing he started seeing were messages from lots of people he never knew, lots of calls from unknown persons mistaking him to be the husband of one certain lady and telling him to hand the phone over to her so that they can talk to her directly.. Meanwhile, this guy had not married. He doesn't even have a serious girlfriend at the moment. To cap it all, he continued receiving series of endless debit and credit alerts on his phones of transactions he knows absolute nothing about.
He first went to the bank to stop the endless alerts, but they told him that he wasn't the one to apply for the change of number, but the original owner of the bank-account.

Now, imagine that this guy here has someone working in the bank who is ready to divulge information to him for some chicken change,, all he needs is just the correct account number of the person, and he would activate the USSD mobile banking options on the bank account..
What if the original owner had already activated USSD Mobile Banking?? In that case, all that the new owner of the line would do is just to dial the USSD mobile banking code for the bank, and start trying his best to change the transaction PIN or Password.

Dear MTN, if you guys may recall,, there is a recent issue which is already in court between You (MTN), Hanan Buhari (President Buhari's Daughter), The DSS, and one Anthony Okolie from Delta State.

To be honest, you MTN are the main cause of all the problems here. You guys blocked off Hanan in the first place and she lost her precious line.. Then you went ahead to sell the same line as a new line to an innocent unsuspecting Anthony.
Tell me, is it his fault that he bought the line..
You guys are totally guilty here.

And the earlier you stop doing this recycling of numbers, the better for you guys.
More criminal cases are still coming.

The case of Anthony Okolie and Hanan Buhari is just the beginning.

PrincessB1:
Not MTN alone

Other network provider are guilty.