Mobiles Without IMEI Number May Face Disconnection

Mobile handsets without the unique identification number, which helps authorities track users, will face disconnections by December 1, Indian Cellular Association (ICA) said on Wednesday.

The International Mobile Equipment Identification (IMEI) is a 15-digit code that identifies a handset and enables security agencies to track down users.

The department of telecom had recently asked the mobile operators not to allow calls to be completed on handsets without IMEI number.

Though there are no official statistics on the number of handsets without IMEI number, an industry guess was around 25 million, Pankaj Mohindroo, President, ICA said.

The Indian Cellular Association had begun a nationwide campaign to create awareness and prevent sale and purchase of such devices.

Proliferation of unbranded phone devices, without IMEI number or with invalid or cloned numbers posed a serious threat to national security as they could not be tracked, he said.

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These devices are mainly sourced from China and are adversely impacting the organized mobile devices market apart from causing huge loss in revenue to the government, he said.