Why RICA will fail

Despite its noble intentions, there are hundreds of reasons why RICA is an even bigger joke than FICA.

A number of serious problems were highlighted when RICA, or the Regulation of Interception of Communications and Provision of Communication-Related Information Act, was required to come into full effect in 2006.

At the time, then-CEO of Vodacom Alan Knott-Craig questioned how possible the enactment of this law would be.

Issues which didn't (and still don't) make sense: like the difficulty in registering "15m to 20m South Africans who simply don't have a residential address". Knott-Craig also added that "we don't seem to be able to convince anybody that it's just practically impossible".

The deadline back then was 12 months from June 2006. Knott-Craig and the heads of the other operators had managed to appeal to Parliament that the proposed plan was impractical.

We don't really know how passionate this plea was, but it seemed to have worked. The need to frantically get everybody "RICA'd" disappeared. That was three years ago.

Suddenly, at the end of last month, the three mobile operators (who never, ever seem to agree on anything) released a joint announcement. "The industry is ready for the implementation of RICA," it trumpeted.

The release spoke in feel-good terms about making "South Africa a safer place", and almost trivialised the size of the task at hand, by simply stating that "customers will have 18 months from implementation date to register both their prepaid and contract SIM cards and SIM cards of subscribers that fail to comply with RICA within the specified time period will be deactivated."

Easy, right?

But there are couple of dozen unanswered questions, some a lot more urgent than others.

What is the process when you buy a starter pack?

Are there people ready to register you? What about the subscriber who buys a SIM starter pack from a spaza shop in Thaba Chitja near the Lesotho border in the rural Eastern Cape? One would assume that this shopkeeper will be in a position to "retain" a certified photocopy of this user's identification document "on which his or her photo, full names and identity number ... appear". Even if this shopkeeper does manage to keep this legal, certified copy, how does the network operator get hold of it, as they are legally obligated to have this record?

Do SIM cards need to be linked to mobile phones?

The Act (not so) clearly states that mobile operators need to keep records of the SIM card, the "cellular telephone number or any other number allocated to the other person" as well as the "number of the cellular phone concerned". Presumably, "the number" means that IMEI identification numbers (phone serial numbers) need to be somehow recorded. How? The networks are very quiet on this.

Is the industry really ready?

Why tell the whole of South Africa that the "mobile industry is ready for implementation of RICA"? It isn't. Have you tried going to a Vodacom/MTN/Cell C store to get yourself registered? It's virtually guaranteed you'll be met with a blank stare. This despite the (remember joint) release saying: "Trained RICA officers will be deployed nationally and are ready to assist customers with the registration process".

What if you don't have a physical address?

Knott-Craig raised this back in 2006, and the rather "simple" solution is thus: "those in an informal residence should provide the address of a school or church closest to the area in which they live". It is said that this big loophole includes retail stores. So I can go to my nearest cellular store and state simply that I do not have a "formal" address. I may be telling the truth and could live in an informal shack in Alexandra. So my "address" is the nearest school. Of course, if the network needed to locate me (according to RICA), it could go to the school gate and find me there. What's to stop me, as a resident in a townhouse in northern Johannesburg, from going to a cellphone shop and stating that I don't have a formal address? Surely I could point to a church near an informal settlement close to my (real) house. There are hundreds of thousands of South Africans living in formal areas, but with no "legitimate" legal address. Witness the suburbs spurting out of Centurion where there are no postal deliveries yet.

Can the police realistically be expected to deal with every lost SIM card?

If you lose your SIM card (or cellphone) and fail to report it, you are held liable. You are, as per RICA, required to report the loss of a SIM-card (or cellphone) "within a reasonable time after having reasonably become aware of the loss, theft or destruction of [it] ... to a police official at any police station". Experts point out that losing a SIM card is now treated by law as equal to losing and failing to report the loss of a firearm. Yes, I can see the men in blue eagerly awaiting the thousands of South Africans queuing to report the theft/loss of their 99c SIM cards. Presumably the SAPS are already on top of this and aware of the procedure. You need only see the response from cops when you try to report a bumper-bashing for insurance. As if the SAPS don't have serious things like murder, hijacking, ATM bombings to worry about...

Can the penalties seriously be enforced?

Failure to report a loss or theft of a SIM card (or phone), "within a reasonable time after having reasonably become aware" of it, means you are guilty of a crime. Networks who have not gathered the required identification of the owners of the SIM cards are also guilty of a crime. In both of these cases, the criminal (yes, you're a criminal now) is liable to a "fine not exceeding R2 000 000 or to imprisonment for a period not exceeding ten years". Expert Arthur Goldstuck points out that you're also guilty of "if you are one of those scoundrels who ‘intentionally and unlawfully, in any manner modifies, tampers with. alters, reconfigures or interferes with, any telecommunication equipment, including a cellular phone and a SIM-card, or any part thereof'; or if you are one of those low-lifes who ‘reverse engineers, decompiles, disassembles or interferes with, the software installed on any telecommunication equipment, including cellular phone and a SIM-card, by the manufacturer thereof; or allows any other person to perform any of the acts referred to'." Are we seriously going to see penalties enforced?

There are countless privacy concerns too, where the "Act allows a wide range of law enforcement agents, under a wide range of circumstances, to access archived information about calls as well as to listen in on calls".

Will this work? No.

There are very few answers at this point but don't forget, the industry "is ready".

What we'll no doubt see is a number of "urgent submissions" made at the end of 2010 (when most of government is on leave), stating the networks' "problems" in registering nearly 45m SIM cards. Government can't exactly force the operators to cut off millions of informal residents who either don't know about the law or simply cannot register.

There is nothing to suggest, from either the networks or from government, that the overriding difficulty of registering 15m to 20m South Africans who simply don't have a residential address has been solved.

But yet, the Unholy Trinity maintains otherwise.

* Hilton Tarrant contributes weekly to "Broadband", a column on Moneyweb covering the ICT sector in South Africa. He has five SIM cards and nearly a dozen old cellphones lying around at home. Theoretically, he's a criminal. Would one of the networks please publish actual details of how this process is going to work?

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