{"id":58277,"date":"2024-12-20T18:04:53","date_gmt":"2024-12-20T18:04:53","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/abujacityjournal.com\/livenews\/?p=58277"},"modified":"2024-12-20T18:04:53","modified_gmt":"2024-12-20T18:04:53","slug":"court-slams-mtn-with-%e2%82%a615-million-fine-over-privacy-violations","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/abujacityjournal.com\/livenews\/2024\/12\/20\/court-slams-mtn-with-%e2%82%a615-million-fine-over-privacy-violations\/","title":{"rendered":"Court Slams MTN with \u20a615 Million Fine Over Privacy Violations"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><strong>By Our Correspondent<\/strong><\/p>\n<p>The Court of Appeal in Abuja has fined MTN Nigeria Communications Limited \u20a615 million for violating a customer\u2019s privacy through unsolicited messages and callertunes.<br \/>\nThe unanimous decision, delivered on Friday by a three-member panel led by Justice Okon Abang, ruled that MTN\u2019s actions infringed on the right to privacy guaranteed under Section 37 of the Nigerian Constitution.<br \/>\nThe case was initiated by public interest lawyer Ezugwu Anene, who accused MTN of disrupting his quiet enjoyment of airtime through unwanted services, even after activating the &#8220;Do Not Disturb&#8221; (DND) option. Mr. Anene also alleged that MTN deducted funds from his airtime for services he never subscribed to.<br \/>\nJustice Abang condemned MTN\u2019s practices as a breach of consumer rights, noting that telecommunications companies must respect customers&#8217; choices.<br \/>\nThe court dismissed MTN&#8217;s cross-appeal, labeling it meritless, and described the unsolicited services as an exploitative practice likely enriching the company unlawfully.<br \/>\nThis judgement overturns a prior ruling by the FCT High Court, which had awarded Mr. Anene \u20a6300,000 in damages.<br \/>\nThe Appeal Court increased the compensation to \u20a615 million, emphasizing that MTN\u2019s conduct warranted exemplary damages to deter similar breaches in the future.<br \/>\nThe ruling marks a significant victory for consumer rights in Nigeria and reinforces the need for accountability among service providers. Further proceedings on the matter remain pending.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>By Our Correspondent The Court of Appeal in Abuja has fined MTN Nigeria Communications Limited \u20a615 million for violating a customer\u2019s privacy through unsolicited messages and callertunes. The unanimous decision, delivered on Friday by a three-member panel led by Justice Okon Abang, ruled that MTN\u2019s actions infringed on the right to privacy guaranteed under Section [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":32,"featured_media":58278,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1386,172],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-58277","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-judiciary","category-news"],"aioseo_notices":[],"amp_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/abujacityjournal.com\/livenews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/58277","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/abujacityjournal.com\/livenews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/abujacityjournal.com\/livenews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/abujacityjournal.com\/livenews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/32"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/abujacityjournal.com\/livenews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=58277"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/abujacityjournal.com\/livenews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/58277\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":58279,"href":"https:\/\/abujacityjournal.com\/livenews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/58277\/revisions\/58279"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/abujacityjournal.com\/livenews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/58278"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/abujacityjournal.com\/livenews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=58277"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/abujacityjournal.com\/livenews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=58277"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/abujacityjournal.com\/livenews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=58277"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}