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The Nigerian Communications Commission (NCC) is seeking to extend its collaboration with the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) to more sectors, using telephone number risk checks to help detect recycled numbers and those associated with fraudulent activities. The initiative is aimed at reducing the risk of unauthorised access to customers’ accounts and digital services as telephone numbers become increasingly important to digital identity and transactions.
The NCC’s Executive Vice Chairman, Dr Aminu Maida, disclosed the plan at the 95th Telecom Consumer Parliament held in Lagos. He said the commission intended to broaden the application of its Telecommunications Identity Risk Management System (TIRMS) beyond its existing collaboration with the CBN.
NCC seeks wider use of TIRMS for fraud prevention
Maida explained that the commission planned to extend TIRMS to sectors where telephone numbers are used to identify customers and facilitate transactions.
“Building on our collaboration with the Central Bank of Nigeria, we intend to extend its use across sectors where phone numbers are used to identify customers and carry out transactions,” he said.
According to Maida, the system would help organisations identify recycled telephone numbers and numbers flagged for fraudulent activity, enabling them to better assess risks associated with customer identification and account access.
“By helping organisations recognise recycled numbers and numbers flagged for fraud, TIRMS can reduce the risk of someone gaining access to another person’s accounts or services,” he added.
The proposed expansion reflects the growing role of telephone numbers in digital identity management. Consumers routinely use their numbers to access financial services, manage pensions and shop online, making the integrity of phone-number records increasingly important to account security.
Recycled numbers can create risks when a number previously assigned to one person is later allocated to another, particularly where digital services continue to associate the number with an earlier account holder. Wider access to risk information could help participating organisations identify potential vulnerabilities before granting access to accounts or services.
Consumer advocates call for better network transparency
Beyond fraud prevention, consumer advocates at the telecom consumer forum called on the NCC and telecommunications operators to address persistent service quality problems, improve billing transparency and make complaint resolution more accessible.
Professor Chiso Ndukwe-Okafor, Executive Director of the Consumer Advocacy and Empowerment Foundation (CADEF), urged the commission to publish telecommunications service quality data at street and community levels.
She said more granular reporting would help expose persistent network failures and enable subscribers to make better-informed decisions about the services available in their areas.
Ndukwe-Okafor also expressed concern that 36 per cent of subscriptions remained on 2G networks. She warned that operators should not depend exclusively on smartphone applications for customer support, as doing so could exclude subscribers using older devices or less advanced networks.
To illustrate the impact of prolonged service problems, she cited the case of an 87-year-old man whose calls reportedly dropped when he moved from one part of his bedroom to another, despite the issue having persisted for two years.
The example highlighted how unresolved network deficiencies can affect consumers’ everyday communication, particularly when complaints remain outstanding for extended periods.
Calls for clearer tariffs and faster complaint resolution
Ndukwe-Okafor urged telecommunications operators to improve transparency around tariffs, data consumption, automatic renewals and deductions. She also called for clear timelines for reversing failed airtime and data transactions.
She argued that subscribers should not have to move between operators, the NCC and other consumer protection agencies to resolve a single complaint. A more coordinated process, she suggested, would reduce the burden on consumers seeking remedies for service failures and billing disputes.
The CADEF executive also called for timely notifications of network outages and accessible complaint channels for persons with disabilities and customers without smartphones.
She emphasised that complaints marked as resolved should result in actual remedies for affected subscribers rather than being closed for administrative purposes.
These concerns place consumer protection alongside fraud prevention as a key issue for Nigeria’s expanding digital economy. Reliable service delivery, transparent billing and effective complaint handling remain important to maintaining public confidence in telecommunications services.
NCC urges operators to improve service quality
The NCC’s Executive Commissioner for Stakeholder Management, Rimini Makama, called on telecommunications operators and other stakeholders to make practical commitments towards improving service quality, billing transparency and consumer protection.
Makama said reliable telecommunications had become essential to the daily activities of Nigerians as digital services continued to expand.
She noted that the quality of telecom services had direct consequences for small business owners waiting for payment confirmations, students participating in online classes and families relying on telecommunications networks to stay connected.
Her remarks underscored the importance of dependable connectivity to economic participation and access to digital services.
Fraud detection and consumer protection remain interconnected priorities
The NCC’s plans to extend TIRMS across more sectors and the concerns raised at the consumer forum highlight two related challenges facing Nigeria’s digital economy: protecting customers from fraud and ensuring that telecommunications services remain reliable and accessible.
Broader use of telephone number risk information could help organisations strengthen customer verification and reduce certain risks associated with recycled or fraud-flagged numbers. However, consumer confidence also depends on network performance, clear billing practices and complaint processes that deliver timely resolutions.
As the NCC engages with the CBN, telecom operators and other stakeholders, the effectiveness of these initiatives will depend on implementation across participating sectors and continued attention to the everyday experiences of subscribers.
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