The President’s Office on December 17 made public the Telecommunication Law and the Radiotelegraphy Law, which will take effect on July 1 2010.

Deputy Minister of Information and Communications Le Nam Thang said that the Telecommunication Law will facilitate individuals and organizations of all economic sectors to invest and do telecom businesses to quickly develop and modernize the country’s telecommunication infrastructure.

Under this new law, the state will only control the charges of the fixed telephone service, which is defined as a social service for all citizens. Service providers will have the right to set the telecom charges for other services but they have to register with the Ministry of Information and Communications before they apply new charges for important services like mobile telecom services or the Internet.

The new law has regulations to control competition among service providers.

The law also clearly points out the duties and missions of telecom service users in providing personal information for the service providers and they have to be responsible for the information they transmit on the telecom market.

Those who use telecom equipment to bug or to steal personal information will be prosecuted under the law.