'Sim box' fraud causes 13 billion FCFA lose in 2015

More than 65 million minutes of calls were diverted by scammers exploiting Sim toolkits, technically called Sim box between January and August 2015, according to sources.

This practice caused Cameroon telecom operators to lose more than 13 billion FCFA over the considered period, revealed a telecommunications expert to the private newspaper Le Messager.

The Sim box, device containing several Sim cards, offer the possibility to its user to display calls coming from abroad as though they are from Cameroon. The fraudster, who actually makes use of this device, can evade the international rates and taxes related thereto, at the expense of telecom operators and the public Treasury.

This is the activity which Fonkou Fosso and Tchioffo Tazioti, two young Cameroonian who were arrested by the police on August 28, 2015 in Douala, were engaged in, revealed the local press.
According to the law of December 21, 2010, on cybercrime and cyber security in Cameroon, these alleged fraudsters may have 5 to 10 years in prison and fines ranging between 5 and 10 million FCFA francs each.