The plans that circulated several months ago outlining that tourists and other foreigners would be forced to use SIM cards that could be tracked by the government, ostensibly for their own safety, have been killed after much opposition.
The plan, by The National Broadcasting and Telecommunications Commission (NBTC), gained early-stage approval but were opposed by both foreigners living in the country and the government, who thought the invasion of privacy might hurt tourism.
The NBTC was going to ensure that, by early 2017, mobile operators placed GPS software into their tourist SIM cards that would let them access locations and call history in case the registered user became the victim or perpetrator of a crime.
These would be the only SIM cards that operators could have sold to foreign travelers.
Currently, the only ASEAN nation to do such a thing is Malaysia.
NBTC secretary-general Takorn Tantasith announced that the discussions about the project have been halted, reported Bangkok Post.
Tourism accounted for 17 percent of Thailand’s GDP last year and is an important industry for the country, with 19 million foreigners visiting the country in the first half of last year.
Representatives for mobile companies as well as government officials agreed that the SIM card plan might have caused trouble, since foreigners might have seen it as intrusive and are protective of their privacy and personal information.
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