Talk:Peru/@comment-24682153-20160406104110/@comment-24682153-20160410092342

In 2015 the law was changed again, from then on in Peru all prepaid (new) lines need to be verfied biometrically by fingerprint. Peru (and Pakistan) are the only countries so far, that are doing this. It's justified by terrorism (Pakistan) or a state of war (Peru).

As all local passports and DNIs (local IDs) have a fingerprint on it, that is registered in a special database they need to compare the given fingerprint at the sales point with the one given in the data base or the line will be blocked. The telcos struggle to comply with the rules: Since June operators are required to verify the identity of new users of prepaid lines via biometric systems that only activate a line once the user's fingerprint matches that on record at the country's national ID register, Reniec.

These are the official rules right now. The question is about foreigners. Long-time residents have a Resident's Card (CE, Carnet de Extranjeria). These people are also registered in the database and can get an activation likewise. Visitors on a tourist visa can't get a CE and are not registered biometrically (at least not in Reniec). So the question is, whether they can still get a SIM legally? They have to be an exception making it a pretty soft loophole in the most rigid registration scheme. The experience of many visitors to Peru in recent years has been, that their SIM was actually registered on a local's name, as either passport registration was impossible or too time-consuming. Whatever, this is blocked now too, as one natural person is only allowed to hold 10 lines of each operator anymore.

I have my doubts about the situation as recent feedback from various visitors, guidebooks and forums suggest that it's has become impossible now to get a SIM legally. Others said yes, but couldn't specifiy how they got the SIM (legally or illegally). But it needs to be noted, that there is a big black market on the streets of Lima of undocumented SIM cards, sometimes for as low as S./5. This makes it a very tricky country to discribe.

As a consequence, I try to gather more information from official sources, telcos as well as travellers and I plan to travel this country soon to verify the situation. When more countries resort to biometric verification, we might face a situation where foreigners are excluded as they are not a part of the database.