TRAI meets financial entities to curb menace of 10-digit numbers spam calls
TRAI met with access providers, RBI, SEBI, IRDAI, Banks and other financial entities, and allocated 160 series exclusively for making transactional and service voice calls.
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The Telecom Regulatory Authority of India (TRAI) met with representatives from the Reserve Bank of India (RBI), the Securities and Exchange Board of India (SEBI), the Insurance Regulatory and Development Authority of India (IRDAI), more than 25 banks and other financial institutions including government, private and global banks, and Members of Association of National Exchanges Members of India (ANMI) and all the Telecom Service Providers, last week to deliberate on curbing the menace of spam calls.
During the meeting, on the recommendations of TRAI, 160 series has been allocated exclusively for making transactional and service voice calls. In the first stage, it has been earmarked for all entities regulated by RBI, SEBI, IRDAI and PFRDA.
Once it is implemented, the meeting noted that it shall help in the easy identification of the calling entity and will prevent the duping of citizen from the fraudsters.
The meeting provided a platform for exchange of ideas amongst the regulators, entities and telecom service providers regarding the effective utilisation of this series. It was also discussed that the operation of 140 series, at present being used for promotional purpose, is being migrated to DLT platform and scrubbing of digital consent is also being operationalised.
With the implementation of above two measures, substantial control on spam calls from 10-digit numbers is expected.
Further, the Digital Consent Facility (DCA) established by Telecom Service Providers under TRAI’s TCCCPR-2018 Regulations was discussed in detail. The DCA facility enables acquisition of digital consent of the customer and further enables 'senders' such as banks, insurance companies and other entities to send promotional communications over SMS and voice to customers irrespective of their DND status.
The role and obligations of senders such as banks, insurance companies and other entities with respect to TRAI regulations was also deliberated and it was decided to whitelist URLs/Apks in the content templates, use of minimum number of headers and content templates, taking immediate action against the entity/TM in case of misuse of senders’ credential etc. All the regulators, banks and other financial institutions emphasised the need to work collaboratively to curb the menace of spam, particularly through voice calls and assured all cooperation for implementation of various initiatives by TRAI in a time bound manner.
