It's all a big hoax
By Sola Fanawopo
Monday, July 26, 2004
 |
|
Mr. Ogugua Chioke, (Vmobile) Chairman, Regulatory Committee
of the Association of Licensed Telecommunications Operators
of Nigeria (ALTON); Ezekiel Fatoye, (Multilinks) at
the press conference on killer GSM calls.
Photo : Sun News Publishing |
|
The Association of Licensed Telecommunications Operators
in Nigeria (ALTON) has described the growing fears over certain
GSM numbers associated with death, as a “complete hoax,
from the telecommunications engineering point of view”.
Last week, a major controversy broke out in the country, particularly
in Lagos, that receivers of calls from certain GSM numbers
would faint or die.
Ogugua Chioke, Chairman, Regulatory Committee of ALTON, who
also doubles as the Chairman of GSM Forum, said for over 50
years of the telecommunications business the world over, there
has been no recorded history of any telephone call that resulted
in death or incapacitation of receivers or callers.
He said: “ALTON, an umbrella body for mobile, fixed
lines and fixed wireless telecommunications operators in Nigeria,
is categorically stating that it is not possible that a phone
call either from mobile or fixed line, whether analogue or
mobile, would result in the death of anybody.”
He said investigations conducted by the organisation revealed
that there is no reported case of homicide either with police
authorities or hospitals resulting from telephone calls, since
the rumour started last week.
He explained that the originators of the rumour, in their
ignorance, started with a non- registered telephone number
with prefix…0801, but later started quoting real GSM
operators when their hoax was blown open.
His words, “It is not possible for any operator to terminate
traffic of a telephone number that is not registered or allocated
on the frequency.”
Eziekiel Fatoye, Executive Director of Multi-Links, said ALTON
is concerned because the rumour is causing anxiety in the
society and if the issue is allowed to continue unchecked,
revenue of the operators would be affected and security of
the country may be compromised. “In fact, the whole
society is at risk, this not good for both the operators and
the society,” he added.
Rueben Mouka, Chairman of the Publicity Committee of ALTON,
said the association is worried because some subscribers no
longer make or answer calls at certain hours of the day, for
fear of death that may result from such actions.
His lamentation, “We are worried because some people
want to damage our investments. Somebody wants to damage our
reputation.”
It would be recalled that one of the numbers touted as a killer
is: 0802 311 1999. When DAILY SUN put a call through to that
number, it rang, but no one answered the call. However, on
further enquiry, it was confirmed by VeeMobile, operators
of the network that hosts that number, as belonging to a real
subscriber. But one other of the touted killer numbers, 0802
222 5999, does not exist.
|
