Hungarian authority in talks with telecom companies over SIM cards – UPDATE

Budapest, October 7 (MTI) – In the wake of recent reports of organised criminals obtaining large quantities of SIM cards in Hungary, the government and telecommunications authority (NMHH) are in talks with mobile phone companies operating in the country on alerting the authorities to suspected activity.

The daily Magyar Idők cited interior ministry sources as saying that the government would soon make a related proposal on taking national security interests into account in cases of such transactions.

The paper said the prime minister and several members of the cabinet as well as counter-terrorism heads have already discussed the issue of SIM cards, and they are examining the possibility of amending the relevant laws or other options for obliging service providers to take appropriate action in similar cases.

The paper noted reports of organised criminals having obtained 200,000 T-Mobile SIM cards by using the identity of a homeless person. A large number of these ended up being used by the terrorist cell that plotted and carried out the Paris and Brussels attacks.