Regarding number portability in my country, you should pay attention to these 7 pieces of information conveyed by the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology

Throughout 2019, there are actually two important keywords for the entire Chinese mobile communications industry: 5G and number portability. The former is the dimension of technological evolution, while the latter is mainly the policy dimension. For ordinary user groups, they are both very important; especially number portability. The "Government Work Report" in March this year has clearly proposed to implement the number portability policy throughout the country, and it has been more than four months now.

Therefore, at the State Council Information Office press conference on July 23, the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology also interpreted hot topics such as number portability. Leifeng.com extracted seven important information about number portability from it.

Why should we promote number portability?

Wen Ku, Director of the Information and Communication Development Department of the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology and spokesperson, said that for a long time, mobile phone numbers have been an important mark for each communication company to provide services to users. Each company has its own number, such as China Mobile's 139, China Unicom's 186, and China Telecom's 189. After the reform of the telecommunications system, our country's communications market has basically formed a pattern of full competition among the three basic telecommunications companies. Each company's products and services have their own characteristics, attracting user groups with different needs to move between networks and change service providers.

Wen Ku said that with the upgrading of mobile communication technology and the rapid development of mobile Internet, mobile phone numbers are no longer just communication user identification, but are widely used in the Internet of all walks of life, becoming the "identity card" of network operation space. Changing mobile phone numbers not only requires high time and economic costs, but may also cause property and safety risks. Number portability can resolve these contradictions. Users can choose the operator that provides services to them without changing their numbers.

What is the goal of number portability?

Allow users to “carry it, transfer it quickly, and use it well”.

According to the "Guiding Opinions on the Construction of Conduct and Correction of Conduct in the Information and Communication Industry in 2019" previously issued by the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology, in addition to requiring the three major operators to accelerate network transformation and system construction, actively carry out network joint debugging and testing, and take effective measures to ensure the implementation of number portability across the country, the "Opinions" also further pointed out that the standardization of number portability services should be deepened, and no additional conditions or obstacles should be added without authorization, and no vicious competition should be carried out using number portability.

What work is required to port your number?

Wen Ku said that from the perspective of full deployment, number portability must properly deal with the two major challenges of huge data volume and wide coverage. To this end, the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology must do a good job in two aspects:

• First, the network and operation systems of the three basic telecommunications companies will be transformed as necessary. my country has nearly 1.6 billion mobile users (Leifeng.com (official account: Leifeng.com) Note: According to the economic operation report of the communications industry from January to May 2019 released by the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology recently, as of the end of May 2019, the total number of mobile phone users of the three basic telecommunications companies reached 1.59 billion). Updating the operation systems of nearly 1.6 billion mobile users is unprecedented from a global perspective and requires a lot of complex and meticulous work.
• Second, it is necessary to carry out synchronous transformation on third-party platforms such as banks, insurance, securities and Internet companies. Mobile phone numbers are widely used in information applications in various industries. To maintain the original applications unaffected, it is necessary for the application systems of various industries to cooperate and ensure the user experience after "number portability".

What challenges does number portability face?

Regarding this issue, the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology stated that my country has a huge number of mobile users and a complex network. Number portability is a complex system project. Not to mention network construction and system upgrades, there are nearly 10,000 test projects per province after the construction is completed. It is the first time that a country like my country, with such a large network and users, has implemented number portability.

The focus and difficulty of the early stage of number portability is that there are about 4.5 million mobile applications in my country, and quite a few of them use mobile phone numbers for authentication, which requires not only the number to be transferred, but also the third-party services to be transferred. At present, many industry SMS and third-party services have been able to achieve portability, but there are indeed a considerable number of third-party apps that cannot keep up, which is also the direction that needs to be worked on in the national promotion stage of number portability.

Zhang Yunyong, director of China Unicom Research Institute, said in an interview with the Beijing News that number portability involves a wide range of issues and is highly complex. Not only do operators need to transform their networks, IT systems, business platforms and user databases, but they also need to conduct joint commissioning and testing between operators, and also involve the simultaneous implementation of related services of Internet companies. Operators will thoroughly implement various tasks under the overall arrangement of the competent authorities.

He said that many non-technical problems were found during the pilot, such as settlement between operators and how to establish a third-party centralized database system that can synchronize data across the entire network. It is necessary to promote the industry and even Internet companies to achieve synchronization. In addition, some problems that seriously affect user perception need to be solved, such as the inability to receive SMS verification codes normally and the inability of users to pay normally through third-party platforms. These problems are difficulties encountered in the process of number portability.

In addition, a China Mobile insider said in an interview:

Number portability is not a technical problem, but it is a systematic project that also involves financial, Internet and other companies. The Ministry of Industry and Information Technology needs to take the lead in further improving the user experience after number portability.

What is the current progress of number portability?

Regarding this issue, Wen Ku said that in order to implement the number portability work, after this year's "Two Sessions", the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology immediately organized three basic telecommunications companies and China Tower Corporation to formulate a "three-stage" work schedule for system construction and transformation, joint debugging and testing, and service provision, and deployed it to promote the "number portability" work across the country. At present, all work is being promoted in an orderly manner, and 5 pilot provinces and cities (Tianjin, Hainan, Jiangxi, Hubei, and Yunnan) have completed the number portability work of 2.3 million users.

For their part, the three major operators are also working intensively on the number portability project.

For example, in early June 2019, China Mobile issued the "China Mobile 2019 Number Portability Project Equipment Centralized Procurement - Single Source Procurement Information Announcement", in which Huawei, ZTE, Nokia, Ericsson and many other companies won the bid; China Mobile pointed out in this announcement that this centralized procurement will transform 290 cash network HSS/HLRs, transform 197 cash network SMS centers, transform 150 cash network SMS gateways, transform 51 cash network MMS centers, transform 329 VPMN SCPs, transform 4 Guangdong Gateway Bureau integrated MGCFs, and build 55 NP MSCs and 52 NP HSS/HLRs - from which we can see the complexity of number portability.

Of course, in addition to China Mobile, China Unicom and China Telecom also have similar procurement actions for number portability. According to the previously announced plan, by the end of August, the three major operators will complete project establishment, procurement, network and system transformation, network testing and other work, meet the conditions for inter-network joint debugging and testing, and the China Academy of Information and Communications Technology will complete the construction and transformation of the centralized business management system and simultaneously build network security facilities.

By the end of October, all operators and CAICT will complete the joint debugging and testing of the entire business process and meet the conditions for system cutover and launch. Before November 10, all operators and CAICT will complete the system cutover and launch, complete system classification filing, risk assessment, compliance assessment and other network security-related work, and be able to provide users with the "number portability" service.

How will the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology ensure the implementation of number portability?

Regarding this topic, Wen Ku, Director of the Information and Communications Development Department of the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology and spokesperson, said that the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology will ensure the implementation of number portability from the following four aspects:

• First, after the national system construction and transformation is completed, a nationwide joint debugging and testing work will be organized to ensure that the system operation meets the standard requirements.
• The second is to formulate management measures. At present, the "Interim Measures for the Management of Number Portability Services" have been drafted and completed, clarifying the service conditions, business processes, service specifications, etc. of number portability services, and will be open to the public for comments in accordance with procedures in the near future.
• Third, we need to strengthen communication with relevant industry authorities and jointly promote the synchronous transformation of third-party platforms such as banks, insurance companies, securities companies and Internet companies to ensure the user's business experience after "number portability".
• Fourth, organize and carry out supervision and inspection to ensure a healthy and orderly market competition environment.

When will number portability finally go live?

Previously, relevant departments have clarified the timetable for the provision of number portability services: before September 20, Tianjin, Hainan, Jiangxi, Hubei, and Yunnan provinces will complete the trial and officially provide services in accordance with the number portability management policy; from November 10 to 25, the number portability service will be put into trial operation in the other 26 provinces (autonomous regions, municipalities directly under the central government). And by November 30, the service will be officially provided nationwide.

In an interview with the Beijing News, Zhang Yunyong, director of China Unicom Research Institute, also stated that despite various difficulties, "it will definitely be launched as scheduled at the end of November."

Summarize

Number portability is undoubtedly an important event in my country's mobile communications field this year, but its influence has actually transcended the scope of users' independent choice of operator services; to a certain extent, this service is to facilitate Chinese users to realize digital identity confirmation with mobile phone numbers as the carrier in the mobile Internet ecosystem - as the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology said, mobile phone numbers have become the "identity card" of network operation space. In addition, the realization of number portability will also mean that my country will keep up with the pace of other countries or regions in the world on this matter.

So we look forward to November 30, 2019.

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