Telecom operators criticized the project to expand the reasons for unscheduled inspections of the RKN and the Prosecutor General’s Office

The largest telecom operators MTS, VimpelCom and MegaFon criticized the draft order of the Ministry of Digital Development on expanding the list of situations in which unscheduled inspections by Roskomnadzor and the Prosecutor General’s Office are possible. In particular, the ministry intends to include in the list the fact that more than 5% of applications for number porting were rejected due to incorrect subscriber data. Operators insist that the share will be high for all market players due to the slow update of subscriber data. The checks will lead to an increase in the “administrative burden on business,” companies believe.

Kommersant got acquainted with the objections of the Big Three operators (MTS, VimpelCom, MegaFon) to the draft order of the Ministry of Digital Development, which proposes to introduce a new “risk indicator of violation of mandatory requirements” in the field of communications. The document was published for public comment on December 12, with feedback from operators dating back to the end of December.

The indicators are used by Roskomnadzor and the Prosecutor General’s Office when deciding whether to conduct unscheduled inspections. Now indicators – grounds for verification – are the non-blocking of prohibited information by TSPU (technical means of countering threats – equipment that operators are required to install according to the law “On Sovereign Runet”; see “Kommersant” of October 4) and the appearance of information that the operator is offering connect to the network before it is put into operation.

It follows from the draft order that a new indicator will be a situation in which a telecom operator rejects more than 5% of applications for number porting in a month due to incorrect subscriber data. The explanatory note to the document states that now the largest number of refusals to port a number occurs precisely because of problems with subscriber information.

The comments of VimpelCom, MegaFon and MTS say that when personal data is changed, the operator does not receive information about this either from the subscriber or from government information systems. “Data is updated only during the next check of the accuracy of the information or when a subscriber contacts for service purposes,” writes VimpelCom. In addition, the company clarifies, operators cannot influence the rate of refusals due to data inconsistencies, since they often find out about this only when they receive an application to port a number.

MTS adds that the draft order does not explain what calculations and data were used to select the 5% indicator. The company proposes to increase it to 20%. MegaFon writes that the donor operator does not control the correctness of the application for number transfer on the part of the recipient operator. “All telecom operators will have a refusal rate of more than 5% of the total number of applications within one calendar month,” the company claims.

Kommersant’s interlocutor at one of the telecom operators insists that the adoption of the norm will increase the risk of unscheduled inspections and “is at odds with the goal of reducing administrative pressure on business.” Officially, VimpelCom, MegaFon, MTS and the Ministry of Digital Development did not respond to Kommersant’s requests.

“A 5% failure rate, for any reason, is unrealistic. According to statistics on MNP (the ability to preserve a mobile number when changing a cellular operator), only every third transfer application was approved, about 61% were rejected for one reason or another,” says Alexey Slukin, author of the specialized Telegram channel “Telekomunalka”. He confirms that the subscriber often does not notify the operator about data changes, and the operator does not receive data from the state.

Alexei Boyko, an analyst at the specialized Telegram channel abloud62, also considers the idea of ​​the Ministry of Digital Development controversial: “The operator cannot control in any way – in some month the share of motivated refusals in MNP will be greater than in another month.” He emphasizes that subscribers have no incentive to notify operators about changes in personal data, although such an obligation is provided for by law. According to the analyst, the threshold in the indicator “should be raised to at least 20%.”

Alexey Zhabin, Yuri Litvinenko