The Federal Government may regulate the use of social media comprising WhatsApp messenger, BlackBerry messenger, Facebook, and Skype.
Premium Times reports that the Nigerian Communications Commission is contemplating on regulating over-the-top services in the country’s telecommunications market.
Nigerian Communications Commission may regulate social media use.
The service known as Over The Top services (OTT) are obtainable via networks, providing value to customers without collaboration with any carrier service provider that should be involved in strategising, selling, provisioning, or servicing them. These services are accessible through Internet communication.
The most common OTT services use in Nigeria are WhatsApp messenger, BlackBerry Messenger, Facebook, Skype and they are all classified under social media applications.
Internet telephony and live streaming are also part of OTT services.
Network providers like MTN, Etisalat, Glo, and Airtel doesn’t have control or guidance over these applications. OTT services are accessible via 3G and 4G networks which offer mobile broadband and high speed IP data.
According to a recent report published recently by the Policy, Competition & Economic Analysis Department of the Nigerian Communications Commission titled: ‘An Overview of Provision of Over The Top [OTT] Services,’ said the services were becoming a threat to the traditional telephone network operators.
The report said the threat OTT pose to traditional telephone network operators is a global issue. This threat is as a result of the fact that Internet telephony is not only cheap, and free in some cases, but it also offers many features previously unavailable with telephones, therefore making it more attractive to consumers.
Another reason these services might be reviewed boils down to the fact that the operators of traditional telephone network pays tolls for their services while the operators of Internet telephony doesn’t pay any fees for their services.
The report said telecom operators like MTN, Etisalat, Glo and Airtel do not have control over WhatsApp, BBM, Facebook and the rest of the social media applications, therefore cannot make any money from the services offered by these applications.
“Many traditional telecom service providers are of the opinion that traditional telephony and SMS revenues are under threat from newer, IP based alternatives like WhatsApp, Skype, Viber etc.
“Similarly, third party web content and social networking companies such as Google and Facebook are increasingly generating huge revenues and driving high levels of data traffic which ride on the broadband networks of traditional telecom operators.
“To further worsen this issue, the traditional operators still have to make significant investments in upgrading their networks to handle the increasing volume of data generated by the same providers of OTT services.
“Most traditional telephone network service providers therefore argue that unless there is a revenue flow to them from such services, they do not have an incentive to continue to maintain or upgrade the networks,” the report said.
The NCC is of the opinion that there is need to regulate OTT services because they could also pose a security threat to the country.
“Because VoIP relies on your Internet connection, it may be vulnerable to many of the same problems that face computers.
“Attackers may be able to perform activities such as intercepting communications, eavesdropping, taking control of phones, making fraudulent calls from an account, conducting effective phishing attacks by manipulating one’s caller ID, and causing service to crash,” the report said.
Nigeria’s legal battle against Africa’s largest mobile operator- MTN, has gotten more fierce as Eric Holder, the former US attorney general, was called upon to defend the telecoms giant. The telecoms company hired the legal luminary to help it fight a record $3.9 billion fine imposed by the Nigerian Communications Commission (NCC) for failing to disconnect unregistered sim cards.
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