31 October

Carriers in Taiwan must check and record a subscriber's name, address and two identity document numbers before activating any line, prepaid or not, and carriers in Japan must confirm a subscriber's name, address and date of birth when signing a contract for mobile voice service. On 31 October 2017, Indonesia's communications ministry began requiring people signing up for prepaid SIM cards to verify their national ID number and family card (household registration) number against the population registry's database, which Bisnis.com reported the ministry as saying was meant to prevent misuse of phone numbers. In March 2018, detikInet reported that one ID number had been used to register 50 phone numbers, which the ministry's written statement called unauthorised use rather than a data leak, and that ID and family card numbers were also circulating on websites. ANTARA and Bisnis.com reported the current communications and digital ministry as saying that Indonesian citizens have had to register new numbers with their ID number plus facial recognition since July 2026, and that each identity may hold at most three prepaid numbers per carrier (checked in October 2026). Readers outside Indonesia do not need to do anything because of these rules.