SHILLONG: The department of telecom (DoT) has identified around 1.52 lakh mobile connections that were issued based on fake or forged documents in six Northeast states.

These SIM cards have been detected in six Northeast states of Arunachal Pradesh, Manipur, Meghalaya, Mizoram, Nagaland and Tripura.

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Telecom Service Providers (TSPs) in these six Northeast states severed over 1.47 lakh mobile connections that failed the re-verification process.

For further investigation and appropriate action against the offenders, TSPs have so far banned 493 point of sale (PoS) and filed 71 police complaints against the suspected PoS.

The majority of cybercrimes, financial frauds, and antisocial activities are carried out using SIMs that have been falsely subscribed on forged documents.

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In order to detect and weed out such suspected SIMs, DoT has taken up the initiative of conceptualising and implementing an innovative and indigenous artificial intelligence and facial recognition-powered solution for telecom SIM subscriber verification (ASTR)—the NextGen platform aimed at preventing cybercrimes.

To identify phoney subscriptions, the system analyses subscriber photos and consults a database of telecom subscriber providers (TSPs).