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posted by n1 on Thursday August 11 2016, @06:42AM   Printer-friendly
from the nothing-to-hide,-everything-to-fear dept.

Thailand is considering a proposal to track the location of all SIM cards acquired by foreigners, be they tourists or resident aliens.

The plan's been floated as a way to assist law enforcement agencies combat trans-national crime. Thailand borders Cambodia, Laos and Burma, three nations that have reasonably porous borders, seldom score well on measures of incorruptibility or governance and have form as participants in heroin supply chains.

[...] The good news is that if your phone roams, you'll be exempt. And with roaming plans now catering to travellers there's a good chance you can bring your phone to Phuket without taking a bath on roaming charges.

Resident aliens will be moved to the trackable SIMs. Many such folk move to Thailand to invest or bring expertise to the nation and are unlikely to be happy that their every move is observed. One small upside is that the nation's telecoms regulators aren't entirely sure how to make the tracking work, with cell connection data and GPS both under consideration.


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  • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday August 11 2016, @09:28AM

    by Anonymous Coward on Thursday August 11 2016, @09:28AM (#386551)

    > organized crime will have plenty of options in order to avoid the tracking

    The easiest one is to get a SIM registered by a local citizen.

    For foreigners that don't want to be tracked: if tourists, roam or don't use a SIM card and phone over WiFi. If expat, don't expat to Thailand anymore.