Share of prepaid mobile subs drops after data reconciliation
The proportion of prepaid mobile phone subscribers in Hungary fell 2.9 percentage points year-on-year to 37% in Q3, after the passing of a data reconciliation deadline, according to a summary of data from the Central Statistical Office (KSH) by state news wire MTI.
Hungarian lawmakers tightened rules on prepaid SIM cards last year amid concerns they could be easily resold to criminals or terrorists. The rules required telcos to check and confirm the personal data of all prepaid subscribers by the end of June 2017.
Industry insiders said most of the SIM cards that were invalidated after the deadline passed were not in use anyway.
The number of postpaid subscriptions rose by 5.5% to almost 7.5 million in Q3, the KSH data show. Total mobile subscriptions were up 0.5% at 11.8 mln.
Mobile data traffic jumped 85% to 39,000 TB during the period. More than 80% of data transfers took place over 4G/LTE networks.
Meanwhile, the number of landline subscriptions fell 1% to 3.1 mln, the data reveal.
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