Lycamobile is doing penance after the Australian Communications and Media Authority found it breached the Telecommunications Act by failing to provide accurate customer data to an important national database.
After issuing a formal warning to the MVNO in May of last year, the ACMA has accepted Lycamobile’s 'enforceable undertaking' to improve the accuracy of customer data the telco provides to the Integrated Public Number Database Manager (IPND).
Despite the somewhat needlessly complicated title, the IPND is actually just an Australia-wide database contributed to by the telecommunications industry, which includes all listed and unlisted phone numbers and corresponding customer data (names, addresses, etc.).
While that sounds like a list that could be exploited for nefarious, Big Brother-like undertakings, it actually exists for good reason – it’s an important source of data for emergency services when responding to emergency calls, and when activating the telephone-based emergency alert system. The database is also used by law enforcement and national security agencies in criminal investigations.
The ACMA requires that all telecommunications providers must supply accurate customer data for all public numbers to the IPND Manager or be in breach of the Telecommunications Act 1997.
So by failing to provide accurate and up-to-date information on its customers to the IPND, Lycamobile has not only breached AMCA compliance codes, but also potentially endangered customers in an emergency situation or police investigation.
Lycamobile has, at least, taken responsibly for the compliance fail, with the ACMA stating that the telco ‘has fully cooperated’ with its investigation.
The ‘enforceable undertaking’ basically means Lycamobile needs to clean its act up, or face further action from the ACMA. Lycamobile has agreed to upgrade its data collection process, audit its existing customer records against address validation software, instigate a comprehensive compliance training process for its employees, and report regularly to the ACMA.
Lycamobile isn't the only telco to be in the ACMA's bad books - as we reported yesterday, Telstra is currently in hot water after overcharging customers for data roaming.
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