Telenor telecom and mobile services to be discontinued in Pakistan?
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ISLAMABAD - A purported notice from the Pakistan Telecommunication Authority (PTA) was shared more than 1,000 times on WhatsApp and Facebook claiming mobile services from provider Telenor would discontinue in Pakistan from December 2019. The claim is false; both the PTA and Telenor have refuted the claim and said the notice is fake.
The purported notice has been shared more than 1,200 times since it was published here link Facebook on November 24, 2019.
The announcement bears the PTA link logo and the link to its website, pta.gov.pk.
The Urdu-language text in the image translates to English as: "Public Notice. All Telenor customers are advised by PTA to use their balance (prepaid credit) at the earliest and if customers are using Easypaisa (mobile vault) then they should transfer their money into a bank account or to another network and if the customers do not want to change their (mobile phone) numbers then they should port their network to any other network by December 10, 2019. From December 11, 2019 no (telecom) service of Telenor will work".
Telenor Pakistan link is a local mobile data and digital services provider link owned by Norwegian company Telenor group.
The English-language caption of the Facebook post states: “End of Telenor Service for ever in pak watan”.
Below is a screenshot of the misleading Facebook post: Screenshot of the misleading Facebook post
The same image was shared here link, here link, here link here link Facebook.
However, the claim is false; both the PTA and Telenor have refuted the claim and confirmed the notice is fake.
"PTA is aware of a false advertisement circulating via WhatsApp chat groups for users of a mobile operator. PTA clarifies that the aforementioned advertisement is fake,” the Authority stated in a tweet link published on November 25, 2019. -APP/AFP
