This comes only nine days after a lengthy disagreement with NIMC over the vNIN platform’s installation.
The PUNCH reported on Monday that the NIMC’s system had a technical malfunction, affecting the capacity of telecoms, banks, immigration offices, and other government institutions to validate their clients’ National Identity Numbers.
In a chat with The PUNCH, a NIMC spokesperson faulted telcos for refusing to migrate to the virtual NIN platform as mandated by the commission.
In a recent development, a source at an MTN outlet in Lagos confirmed that, following a series of meetings, preparations and arrangements were in the works to migrate to the vNIN platform in order to resume the provision of SIM-related services, which had been halted for more than a week.
The source said, “We’ve been having meetings. Our system was created to use searching by NIN. Now we have to upgrade our systems to be able to search with vNIN. That’s the meeting we’ve been having.
“The NIMC-improved NIN slip is the one that has a barcode, but we still need to be able to put it in the portal on our system. That’s what they are working on. We are trying to enable our system to be able to create the option of vNIN. What we have is search by document ID.
“There is no search by vNIN. There are other ways that we are also trying and some stores have been able to successfully do swap today but it’s for customers that have already linked their line (to their NIN). By tomorrow’s meeting, I believe we will finalize it.”
MTN Nigeria, however, informed customers on Wednesday that they would now be needed to present their Virtual NIN or the improved NIN slip for all SIM-related services.
This was disclosed by the firm in a vNIN update flier. According to the company, only vNIN or the improved NIN slip may be used for SIM registration, replacement, mobile number portability, NIN linkage, and 4G upgrading.
It said, “vNIN is a tokenized version of a person’s actual NIN, it is a 16-digit alphanumeric (ABCXYZ1249872DK…) NIN that customers will be required to generate either via NIMC mobile App, via the improved NIN slip with QR code for scanning using the NIMC mobile app or USSD channel for any SIM related services.
“The virtual NIN tokens are merchant-specific and expire after a set period of time (usually 72 hours). This means that a token generated for company MTN cannot be used or verified by company Airtel.”
