Portable Numbers Mandated

By The Moscow Times

May 29, 2012

Subscribers who want to change mobile phone operators but retain their number will eventually be able to do so.

Beginning in 2014, wireless carriers will be required to provide reconnection within three days for free. That stipulation is included in amendments to the law on communications published on the Communications and Press Ministry website, Vedomosti reported Tuesday.

Data on transferred numbers and their owners will be stored in a database created and maintained with operators' money. One-time costs to create the database could be $10 million, and maintenance could cost up to $1 million a year, while modernization of the infrastructure to allow operators to make the transfers could cost up to $400 million, according to the explanatory note to the document.

(MT)

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