The Phones With No Name

If you have not registered your prepaid Spanish phone then you had better get cracking because all unregistered pre-paid mobile phone lines in Spain will be permanently disconnected at midnight Sunday night. Despite the objection made by the phone companies the Spanish government insists that all pre-paid mobile phones numbers which have not been registered by midnight on Sunday night will disappear forever. The phone companies wanted to delay the switch off of what they say will be some three million lines. Its seems to me the date of the action has been in the public arena for some time. The measure comes as a result of the Madrid train bombings in 2004 where anonymous pre-paid phones were used to set off the explosives. The Law for the Conservation of Data in Electronic Communications came into effect in Spain two years ago and obliges the phone companies to keep all the data on the destination and origin of calls, as well as the identity of all the people implicated in the communication. Any one who has not registered there phone will find it no longer works and that any credit they have is lost. For some time now any one who purchased a phone or new sim had to give details and show prove of who they are and where they live.
What we need now is for other countries to do likewise for the actions to be fully effective.